Tesco has revealed ‘disappointing’ Christmas sales with like-for-like sales falling 2.3%, excluding fuel and VAT, despite delivering a “good Christmas shopping experience” for its customers.
Total sales in the UK, including VAT and petrol grew by 3.8% and by 1.7% excluding petrol, with group sales increased by 5.2% including petrol for the six weeks to 7 January 2012.
Philip Clarke, chief executive at Tesco, said: “In a challenging economic environment, we made good progress internationally but despite record sales, we are disappointed with our seasonal trading performance in the UK.
“We will continue the process of change that we started nine months ago to address long-standing business issues, building on the important steps we have already taken in the United States, in Japan and at Tesco Bank, as well as those we have begun to take in the UK. The Big Price Drop is an important first element in this process but there is much more we can do to further improve our shopping trip for customers and we are determined to move faster. We will say more in our preliminary results announcement in April.”
There was growth overall in general merchandise, clothing and electricals, with an improved performance in electronics in particular being driven by strong sales of tablet computers and e-readers.
Online sales were stronger in both food and non-food with total online sales growth of more than 14%. Approaching one million orders were placed with Tesco Direct during the period, of which over two-thirds were collected in store.
In Europe, total sales grew by 7.0% (2.0% at actual exchange rates). Like-for-like sales growth was pleasing and overall stronger – at 1.0% excluding petrol – than the third quarter performance.
In the United States, Fresh & Easy continued its strong run of form, helped by a successful Christmas and New Year period. Total sales grew by 41% and like-for-like sales growth also remained strong at 19.3%, driven by the improvements the business has delivered for customers and building on the good progress made earlier in the financial year.
The supermarket’s plan for 2012/13 now reflects substantially increased investment to deliver an even better shopping trip for customers – particularly in the UK.
Source: Tesco
