Sainsbury’s records sales boost

Sainsbury’s non-food business has driven a boost in sales growth of 2.9 per cent in its second quarter.

The supermarket chain saw like-for-like sales in the 16 weeks to 2 October increase from 1.1 per cent in the previous quarter excluding petrol but including VAT.

The group said non-food was growing at three times the rate of food.

Sainsbury said it was outperforming the market, a day after rival Tesco, the UK's number one supermarket, posted a gain in UK like-for-like sales of 1.3 per cent quarter-on-quarter. S

ainsbury's said excluding fuel, total sales were up 5.2 per cent, compared to 4.4 per cent last quarter, but warned rising fuel prices were putting pressure on household budgets.