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Sales at Waitrose fell 0.1% in the week to 19 September, which the supermarket has blamed on “tough comparatives”.

Sales dropped to £120.8m and including petrol this represented a 0.3% fall. Waitrose said: “The same week last year featured significant marketing activity and voucher redemption.”

It added that the start of the Rugby World Cup had “led to a noticeable change in buying patterns”, with a shift towards convenience food that can be shared. Packs of Pringles were up 150% and pizzas saw sales increase by 45%. Beer predictably saw a rise in sales, up 16%, as people prepared to watch the opening games.

Waitrose’ sales, ex petrol, are up 1.1% in the first 7 weeks of the second half of its financial year.

Morning update

It’s a typically quiet Friday for the markets this morning, with no new company updates of note.

But it’s been a bouyant start to trading in London this morning, with the FTSE 100 already 1.9% up to 1,6,073.5pts. 

In particularly there’s been an excellent morning for M&S (MKS), which is up 3.4% to 500.5p. Other strong climbers include Unilever (ULVR), up 2.1% to 2,592p, and Coca-Cola HBC (CCH), up 1.9% to 1,413p. The supermarkets have also had a decent start to the day - all up between 1.7% and 2% - reversing yesterday’s falls (see below). 

Yesterday in the City

Poundland (PLND) shares plummeted to their lowest ever level yesterday after revealed its own like-for-like sales were falling and that 99 Stores’ performance had deteriorated since it agreed the £55m takeover.

The shares plunged by 13.4% by close of trading to an all-time low of 268p – well below its 300p IPO price and more than 36% down since its February high of 421p when it announced the 99p Stores deal.

Conviviality Retail (CVR) secured shareholder approval for its Matthew Clark bid, which now just needs the approval of Punch Taverns shareholders on 1 October. If that approval is received, the new enlarged Conviviality (after its successful £130m share placing) will begin trading 2 October. The shares edged up 0.3% to 182p.

Sports nutrition supplier Science in Sport was 5.5% down to 64.5p after announcing it had slipped to a – albeit expected – first half loss.

The FTSE 100 slipped below 6,000pts again yesterday, falling 1.2% to 5,961.4pts on weaker mining and industrial stocks.

Grocery stocks escaped the worst of the falls, but the supermarkets were all trending down. Sainsbury’s (SBRY) was 2.2% down to 223.7p, Tesco (TSCO) down 2% to 165.2p and Morrisons (MRW) down 1.8% to 149.9p. Ocado (OCDO) fell 4.2% to 316.1p.

Alcoholic drinks producers slipped again, with SABMiller (SAB) down 1.8% to 3,503.5p and Diageo down 1.1% to 1,713.5p.

The day was not quite so bad for food producers, with a number of notable risers. On the up were Finsbury Food Group (FIF), up 3.5% to 102.5p, Tate & Lyle (TATE) up 3.3% to 569.5p and Purecircle (PURE), up 1.8% to 415p.

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