Dunnes Stores has retained its position once again as Ireland’s leading supermarket, following a ‘recording-breaking’ festive period, with year-on-year sales growth of 3.4% for the industry.
The Irish retailer secured 23.1% of the grocery market share, according to latest figures from Kantar Worldpanel in Ireland, for the 12 weeks ending 27 January 2019.
The report showed that Dunnes attracted enough new shoppers to boost its sales by 4%.
“Dunnes continues to engender loyalty among its existing shoppers with its strong premium own label and branded ranges.
“Crucially, the retailer has won over new shoppers as well, welcoming an extra 20,000 households through its doors compared with last year.”
Tesco secured 22.1% of the market share, SuperValu 21.6% followed by Lidl with 10.6% and Aldi 10.9% respectively.
Demonstrating Popularity
Aldi and Lidl continued to gain market share and more than 70% of Irish households shopped at both during the past 12 weeks, the research indicated.
“Aldi and Lidl have demonstrated their popularity at two distinctly different times of year – December and January – by providing shoppers with opportunities to both indulge and save,” Douglas Faughnan, consumer insight director at Kantar Worldpanel.
“Both retailers achieved record market share over Christmas and that strong performance has continued into the new year – Aldi increased sales by 10% and Lidl by 5.2%.”
Good Intentions
Overall, despite shoppers tightening the purse strings, the report shows a strong start to 2019.
“After an indulgent festive period, many Irish shoppers started the year with good intentions and January sales of fruit and vegetables were up €7 million year on year,” Faughnan added.
“Vegetable side dishes and vegetarian sausages and burgers collectively rose by 35% and, amid the rising popularity of Veganuary, sales of plant-based milks were 40% higher than in January 2018.”
Dry January
Dry January may have dominated headlines and social media feeds but not everyone abstained, the report showed.
According to Faughnan more than a third of Irish households bought either beer, cider or wine in January.
“Wine proved to be the most popular – 25% of shoppers took home at least one bottle during the past four weeks.” He concluded.
© 2019 Checkout – your source for the latest Irish retail news. Article by Donna Ahern. Click subscribe to sign up for the Checkout print edition.
