Asda Becomes No. 2 Among U.K. Grocers

Asda Group PLC, the British supermarket chain that’s owned by Wal-Mart Stores Inc. of Bentonville, has overtaken J Sainsbury PLC to become the United Kingdom’s second-largest grocer, according to data from Taylor Nelson Sofres PLC.

The latest TNS Superpanel’s Total Till Roll data shows that for the four weeks ended July 20, Asda’s market share moved to 17 percent from 16.1 percent compared with the same period a year before, reported Dow Jones Newswires. Sainsbury’s share fell to 16.2 percent from 17.1 percent.

The swap puts Sainsbury’s in the No. 3 position in the United Kingdom, behind Asda and market leader Tesco PLC. As recently as 1995, Sainsbury was the United Kingdom’s largest grocer.

Till Roll data measures overall trading at tills in stores and excludes gasoline and in-store concessions such as tobacco.

According to the TNS data, Sainsbury remains ahead of Asda in fresh foods. Much of Asda’s growth was in non-food sales, such as clothing and electronics.

In a statement, Sainsbury said data from TNS for the 12 weeks ended July 20 showed it had a 15.5 percent market share of the grocery market, compared with Asda’s 13 percent, making it the United Kingdom’s second-largest grocery chain when the entire three months is taken into consideration.