Kantar Worldpanel has said that private label sales are a 'major source of growth' for UK retailers, with own-brand sales in Britain's ten biggest retailers up 6.0% in the 12-week period to 21 May.
This is in compared to branded products, which saw sales rise by 0.6% over the same period, the research firm said.
Retail Winners
Among the private label success stories over the period were Asda's recently-revamped 'Farm Stores' range, which "helped increase sales of the grocer’s cheapest private label tier by over 20% year on year," said Chris Hayward, consumer specialist at Kantar Worldpanel.
More than 9.2 million households bought Asda value own label products during the past 12 weeks: one million more than last year, according to Kantar Worldpanel.
Elsewhere, Morrisons 'The Best' range has been "key to the retailer's success', according to Hayward, with "ales up by over a third on last year as nearly 800,000 additional shoppers chose products from the line during the past 12 weeks."
At The Co-operative, which grew sales by 1.5% in the period, premium own-label sales were a core driver - sales of its ‘Irresistible’ range were up 33.7% year on year.
The latest Kantar Worldpanel market share figures for the period indicate that all ten of the UK's largest supermarkets saw sales rise, with Aldi (+19.8%), Lidl (+18.3%), Ocado (+9.4%) and Iceland (+8.6%) seeing the largest gains.
© 2017 European Supermarket Magazine – your source for the latest retail news. Article by Stephen Wynne-Jones. Click subscribe to sign up to ESM: The European Supermarket Magazine.
