Agenda: John Lewis Partnership, Kantar Nielsen and BRC-KPMG

BRC-KPMG retail sales data

BRC and KPMG will publish their latest retail sales figures on Tuesday, for the month of February. Retail sales rose at the fastest rate since June in January, up 1.8% year on year after two months’ of decline. Total sales climbed 2.2% weeks in the month.

Kantar Nielsen grocery market share

The latest grocery sales and market share data will also be released on Tuesday.

Sainsbury’s will hope the figures bring better news after its proposed merger with Asda was dealt a hammer blow by the CMA. The supermarket giant lagged its big four rivals in the 12 weeks to January 27, suffering a 0.3% drop in sales, according to Kantar data.

By contrast, Asda and Morrisons registered growth of 0.7% and 0.4% respectively, while Tesco clocked up its fastest sales climb since September 2018 after clocking up a 1% increase.

John Lewis Partnership

The partnership will report its final results on Thursday, which are expected to be subdued. The partnership reported a slight increase in festive sales at the beginning of the year with gross sales up 1.4% to £2.2bn in the seven weeks to January 7, as sales at the department store recorded a 2.5%. Waitrose posted a 0.2% rise in sales.

John Lewis will also announce its bonus level, which is expected to be zero or close to zero. The partnership said at its Christmas trading update that it would “need to consider carefully… whether payment of a bonus is prudent in the light of business and economic prospects at that time”. If it decides not to, it would mark the first time since 1953 the partners have gone without.