Supermarket chain Morrisons has reported today that its sales over the festive period were better than expected and beat the previous year, showing an increase of 0.2% on like-for-like sales in the nine weeks to January 3rd, excluding fuel.
Analyst Paul Thomas from Retail Remedy, commented that the supermarket’s figures were expected to have fallen by between 2% - 3%, however the company are evidently focusing on "its core market and core product" and that its new strategy was "paying off" for them.
The rise in sales comes as Morrisons continues to slash prices by 3.2% in the last year and 7% over the next two years, despite total sales decreasing 1.2% due to people buying less.
The supermarket has maintained its profit forecast, expecting full year underlying profit to be in the region of £295million to £310million and helping maintain these costs will be the closure of a further seven stores, but has no plans to close any more in the future.
