British supermarket chain J Sainsbury beat forecasts with its biggest quarterly underlying sales rise for 2.5 years, helped by its participation in the Comic Relief charity day on March 13th.
The 140-year-old firm, with more than 500 supermarkets and over 275 convenience stores, said todaysales at shops open at least a year rose 6.2 pe rcent, excluding fuel, in the 11 weeks to March 21st, up from 4.5 per cent in the third quarter.
Forecasts ranged from 4.7 per cent to 5.8 per cent, with an average of 5.5 per cent, in a Reuters poll of eight analysts.
Sainsbury, the biggest corporate partner for Comic Relief, estimated the event boosted sales by 0.3 percentage points and helped it to attract over 19 million customers that week, its highest number of weekly transactions outside of Christmas.
Adjusted for the recent, temporary reduction in value-added sales tax, underlying sales rose 7 per cent, the firm said.
Sainsbury has defied predictions it would suffer in the economic downturn from its mid-market positioning, taking custom from upmarket rivals like Marks & Spencer while holding into cash-strapped shoppers with innovative campaigns like "feed your family for a fiver" and "love your leftovers."
"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," it said in a statement.
Sainsbury's growth has outstripped market leader Tesco, which posted a 2.5 per cent rise in underlying sales for the seven weeks to January10tg, though it has lagged closest rivals Asda and Morrison.
Sainsbury shares have outperformed the DJ Stoxx European retail index by 20 per cent over the past year and closed at 330.75 pence on Tuesday, valuing the business at about£ 5.6 billion
Reuters