Share price down after Sainsbury’s reported bumper Christmas

Shares slightly dip on Friday despite retail giant Sainsbury’s claiming to have won grocery market share for the fifth consecutive Christmas, with sales up nearly four per cent.

Simon Roberts, chief executive of Sainsbury’s informed shareholders on Friday that “half of big Christmas baskets contained a Taste the Difference product, helping Taste the Difference deliver sales growth of 16 per cent, outperforming all key competitors.”

He also pointed out that Sainsbury’s party food sales jumped nearly 40 per cent, and more than 200 bottles of fizz were sold every minute in the key days ahead of Christmas, over one-third of which were Taste the Difference.

Over the six-week Christmas period, retail sales grew 3.8 per cent on the previous Christmas, while its overall sales rose 3.7 per cent.

Share price drops

Despite that, its share price dropped by over 3 per cent on Friday morning down to 254.91p.

Richard Hunter, head of markets at interactive investor stated that “share price reactions to the updates so far have been decidedly mixed, with investors choosing for some to ignore the success of the Christmas period and focus heavily on the undoubtedly challenging times to come.”

The grocer pointed to its Nectar card prices as one of the keys to the growth.

Sainsbury’s stated it remains on track to deliver incremental profit of at least £100m in the three years to FY26/27.

It was revealed that one in four people in the UK visited the Argos website over Black Friday weekend, “a significant increase year on year”.

Over the third quarter, sales were most substantial in technology.

However, the toy market was weak, and customer demand in more prominent ticket categories, including furniture and larger consumer electronics, remained subdued.

The grocer said it continues “to make good progress against our target to deliver £1bn of cost savings by March 2027”.

Sainsbury’s staff pay rise

Sainsbury’s revealed to its shareholders that it was increasing the pay for retail colleagues by five per cent this year, split into two increases in March and August.

The group stated that this move “will allow us to navigate a challenging cost environment while ensuring we continue to lead the sector in how we reward our brilliant colleagues”.

Staff across both Sainsbury’s and Argos will move to £12.45 per hour in March and £13.70 for those based in London, with a further increase to £12.60 per hour in August and £13.85 for those based in London.

Roberts explained: “Our people are fundamental to achieving our next level Sainsbury’s plan and we are pleased to announce that we will raise pay for our hourly-paid colleagues by five per cent in the year ahead, split into two separate increases to help manage a particularly tough cost inflation environment.”

“We believe in rewarding our colleagues well for delivering leading service and productivity and we will be the best paying UK grocer from March,” he added.

This comes after Roberts cautioned back in November that new government measures of its national insurance hike would hit shoppers with higher prices by adding £140m to the supermarket’s costs.

“Within the supermarket sector, where prices are central to success, remaining competitive comes at a cost. For Sainsbury, the investment in lowering prices over recent times will come under additional pressure, especially following the outcome of the measures announced in the Budget,” Hunter added.

In its outlook for the year ahead, the grocer said it expects to deliver full-year underlying operating profit “in line with consensus” and the midpoint of £1.01bn – £1.06bn guidance range.

While it now expects total financial services underlying operating profit to be around £30m, previous guidance was between £15m and £25m. It expects to generate retail free cash flow of at least £500m.