Morrisons pre-Christmas trading was below expectations, the Bradford-based supermarket group revealed today.
The UK's fourth largest supermarket was the first of the superstore giants to unveil its seasonal trading performance and reported a slowdown in sales in the run-up to Christmas, underlining the fierce competition in the supermarket sector over the crucial period.
The company, which has 450 stores in the UK, saw like-for-like sales excluding VAT and fuel increase 0.7 per cent in the six weeks to January 1, compared with 2.4 per cent in the previous quarter. The City had expected sales growth of one per cent .
The slowdown came despite Morrisons claiming a record number of customers, with an extra 800,000 a week shopping there during the period.
The battle for sales gathered pace in early October when Tesco introduced its Big Price Drop, prompting Sainsbury's to launch a price-matching scheme and Asda to slash petrol prices.
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