Asda market share dips for 10th consecutive period

According to Kantar Worldpanel, for the 12 weeks ending 3 October, Asda reported growth of just 3.2% and a market share of 17.1% of all till receipts, compared with 17.2% for the same period in 2009.

Overall growth in the market at 4.1% remains ahead of grocery inflation at 3%. Kantar Worldpanel said that, regardless of fears about food inflation, it still expects the rate to be held around 4% by the year end.

Tesco maintained its share of the market, at 30.9%, while Sainsbury’s had the best quarter among the top four supermarkets, up from a 15.7% share of the market in 2009 to 15.9%. It is the 20th consecutive time that Sainsbury’s has seen its share of sales grow, according to Kantar Worldpanel’s figures.

Waitrose appears to be seeing the benefits of its Tesco price-matching campaign, which launched on September 27. Its share of the market rose by 0.2 percentage points year-on-year to 4.2%, with sales growth of 9% to £912m.

Kantar Worldpanel communications director Edward Garner said: “Asda continues to see its share under pressure with a drop of 0.1% but this is better than in previous months and we are currently seeing the re-launch of Asda’s core own-label range through the ‘Chosen by You’ campaign.”

At the discount end of the market Aldi maintained its 3% share of the market, with sales up by 3.4% year on year to £645m, while Lidl saw sales rise by an impressive 5.9% to £523m, its share of till sales remaining steady at 2.4% of the total.