UK shoppers spent £13.7bn on groceries in the run-up to Christmas – 7% more than a year before – as they sought out bargains and switched to discounters to try to offset price inflation.
The number of items bought rose by 2% in December as prices climbed by 6.7%, according to analysts at Kantar, although that was down from 9.6% in November – making it the biggest monthly drop in inflation the data firm has ever recorded.
