Chart: Grocery price inflation hits highest level since early 2024

“This latest jump in grocery price inflation takes us into new territory for 2025,” said Fraser McKevitt, head of retail and consumer insight at Kantar.

Prices are rising fastest in markets including chocolate, suncare, plus butters and spreads. “Households have been adapting their buying habits to manage budgets for some time, but we typically see changes in behaviour once inflation tips beyond the 3% to 4% point as people notice the impact on their wallets more,” said McKevitt.

Spending on grocery promotions rose by 5.1%, outpacing overall grocery sales growth of 4.4%. “Own label lines are ones to watch, with premium own label, in particular, being the fastest growing part of the market since September 2023,” McKevitt added.

Discounters also continued to grab market share. Aldi and Lidl saw combined year-on-year sales grow by 8.4% in the 12 weeks to May 18, their strongest increase since January 2024.

Lidl’s market share of 8.1% and Aldi’s market share of 11.1% are both record highs.

There was also no sense that the cybersecurity incident was having a dampening effect on food and drink sales at Marks & Spencer. Grocery sales at the retailer were up by 12.3% year on year.

Kantar has also pulled out what is currently popular in supermarket baskets, with health and exercise seemingly driving a lot of consumer behaviour. Sales of sports nutrition products were up by 45% in the past five months versus the same period in 2024.

Volume sales of cottage cheese, flatbreads and fresh prepared fruit have also all seen double-digit increases.

“It seems that consumers are shaping their diets around their lifestyle choices, with health, wellbeing and exercise apparently top of many people’s minds,” said McKevitt.