Marks and Spencer’s food business grew like-for-like sales by 0.1 per cent in the 13 weeks to 27 December.
Total food sales rose by 2.8 per cent, while sales in the Christmas week were up 17 per cent.
The premium retailer said it had seen “record Christmas sales” in food, which “strongly outperformed the market”.
Despite a strong performance in the category, total like-for-like UK sales for the company fell by 2.7 per cent, after a dismal performance in its general merchandise division, which includes womenswear, and where like-for-like sales were down 5.8 per cent.
“Our food business delivered another excellent quarter, significantly outperforming the market by around three percentage points,” said CEO Marc Bolland.
“We saw record sales over the festive period, up 17 per cent in the key Christmas week. Customers once again turned to us for our highly differentiated food offer, combining the best of quality, seasonal speciality and convenience, all at competitive prices.
“We launched nearly 750 new products giving customers more choice than ever, with record results in turkeys, party food, desserts and deli,' he said.
Bolland said disruption at the company’s Castle Donington distribution centre “strongly impacted” .com and general merchandise performance in December.
And he said overall international business was “heavily impacted” by the worsening currency and economic issues across its Middle East and Russia franchise region, butthe business had performed well in other key markets such as India.
M&S will report its fourth quarter trading results on 2 April 2015.
