UK grocery retailer Sainsbury’s has recorded a “strong” performance in its fourth quarter trading statement, with sales rising in the first three months of this year.
The retailer said that like-for-like sales during the final quarter of its 2008/09 trading year, covering the 11 weeks to 21 March 2009, increased by 6.2 per cent excluding fuel.
This contributed to a rise in full-year like-for-like sales of 4.5 per cent excluding fuel, which the group said reflected increased customer numbers and basket growth.
Sainsbury’s chief executive, Justin King, said: “Our work on providing universal customer appeal through continued investment in price, quality and a broader product range has been well received and is evident in the sales.
“We are serving more customers with more items as both transactions and basket size have increased year-on-year. We have also maintained our high performance levels in key customer metrics, such as product availability and service.
“Our price perception metric recorded the biggest improvement of the measurements we track on a regular basis.”
Mr King said the retailer was also seeing “some significant changes” in the mix of products that customers are choosing to buy, with sales of its ‘basics’ value range up by 60 per cent compared with the previous year.
He added: “We expect the current economic environment to remain challenging but our focus on delivering universal appeal through great products at fair prices means we are well positioned to continue our good progress.”
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