Black Friday put supermarket sales back in the black for the first time in more than four months.

Overall supermarket sales (excluding the discounters) were up 0.1% year on year in the week ending Saturday 29 November - the first weekly year-on-year increase recorded by analysts IRI since the week ending 26 July, when sales rose 0.3% [IRI].

The sort of deals that sparked scuffles in some retailers also appear to have generated increased footfall and a slight upturn in food and drink sales. Total supermarket grocery sales were down 1.9% in Black Friday week, compared with an average decline of 2.2% in the 12 weeks before.

With stores offering deep discounts on products such as TV and computer tablets, the growth was driven by a 6.1% hike in non-food sales - up £27m year on year.

This was a big improvement on typical trading in non-food, which has been static for much of the year.

The electrical goods, photographic and mobile phone categories accounted for £20m of the extra spend, and other areas to benefit were toys (up 8.8% year on year) and housewares (up 15%).

“Shoppers who were planning to buy a ­television set before Christmas may well have moved their spend forward to Black Friday,” said Martin Wood, head of strategic insight for retail at IRI.

But he added he believed any negative effect from funds being diverted into early Christmas spend would have been offset by the footfall-driving effect of the Black Friday deals.

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