Grocery inflation rises to 2.6% as Be Ready campaign lifts sales of bottled water and tins
Hand sanitiser sales jumped 83% after the government's emergency advice, but Worldpanel says households topped up their weekly shop rather than panic buying.
Grocery prices in Britain were 2.6% higher in the four weeks to 1 November than a year earlier, up from 2.5% the month before, according to the latest figures from Worldpanel by Numerator.
The researcher said inflation had started climbing again after slowing over the summer, though it remains lower than at the start of the year. It added that October's rise in the energy price cap had already squeezed household budgets. Spending on groceries was up 2.2% on the same period last year.
What people bought after the Be Ready advice
The government's Be Ready campaign asks households to keep enough supplies to manage for up to three days if essential services are disrupted, and the Prime Minister backed the advice last month.
Worldpanel tracked sales in the ten days from 22 October, after the campaign was launched. Compared with the same period last year:
- hand sanitiser sales rose 83%
- bottled water sales rose 67%
- sales of tinned and jarred food rose 37%
The number of people buying tinned meat each day went up by 43%, about 400,000 extra shoppers a day. The typical pack size bought stayed at around 500g.
Worldpanel said this was not panic buying. Fewer than a third of households bought bottled water in October, and the growth came from more people adding items from the government checklist to their normal shop.
Cheaper pumpkins
The average pumpkin cost £1.20, 12% less than last year, and 3.3 million households bought one. The number sold was 10% higher. Sales of tubs of sweets were up 28%.
Who gained ground
Over the 12 weeks to 1 November, Lidl's sales rose 6.6%, the biggest market share gain of any grocer at 0.4 percentage points, taking it to 8.6% of the market. Online grocer Ocado grew sales by 12.3%, its 30th period in a row of double-digit growth, and matched its record share of 2.3%.
Tesco remains the biggest grocer with 27.8% of the market, followed by Sainsbury's on 15.5%, its highest share since April. Asda has 11.3%, Aldi 10.4%, Morrisons 8.3%, Co-op 5.3%, Waitrose 4.5% and Iceland 2.2%. M&S, which co-owns Ocado's retail business, increased grocery sales in its own shops by 14.6%.
Shoppers spent £4.4bn on general goods in Black Friday week last year, according to Worldpanel.
