Tesco the best Christmas performer among major UK grocers: Nielsen

[LONDON] Tesco saw the strongest overall sales growth amongst Britain's big four supermarket chains over the key Christmas quarter, industry data showed on Tuesday.

Researcher Nielsen said market leader Tesco's sales rose 3.4 per cent year-on-year in the 12 weeks to Dec. 30.

That was ahead of growth of 2.1, 1.7 and 1.2 per cent at Asda , Morrisons and Sainsbury's respectively.

Tesco held its market share at 27.5 per cent, while the other three saw their shares slip as German-owned discounters Aldi UK and Lidl UK enjoyed sales growth of 12.8 per cent and 15.7 per cent respectively in the quarter, Nielsen said.

Nielsen said Asda, the British arm of Walmart, had the best sales performance of the big four in December, with growth of 3.7 per cent - ahead of Morrisons, up 3.4 per cent, and Tesco, up 3.2 per cent.

Rival market researcher Kantar Worldpanel will also publish supermarket sales data for the Christmas period on Tuesday.

Morrisons has also published its Christmas trading update.

REUTERS