The price of seafood sold by United Kingdom grocery chains has risen steadily over the past 12 months and this has lifted the overall value of seafood sales in the retail channel, yet the volume of products bought by shoppers has continued to decline, finds the latest Nielsen ScanTrack data supplied by the U.K. Seafish Authority.
U.K. consumers paid an average GBP 10.47 (USD 13.68, EUR 12.10) per kilogram for their seafood in the 52 weeks that ended 23 February, 2019, an increase of 1.3 percent year-on-year. In terms of price per unit, they paid an average GBP 2.83 (USD 3.70, EUR 3.27), which matched the level seen in the previous 12 months.
The higher prices contributed to a total sales value in excess of GBP 3.28 billion (USD 4.3 billion, EUR 3.8 billion), up 0.4 percent, with an equal increase in unit sales to 1.16 billion. But the total volume of seafood purchased fell by a larger margin of 0.9 percent to 313,418 metric tons (MT).
Seafish’s retail sales figures, which do not include the discounter chains, also confirmed that chilled seafood, which accounts for almost two-thirds of total purchases, experienced a very slight fall in sales value, reaching GBP 2.1 billion (USD 2.7 billion, EUR 2.4 billion) for the 12-month period. The volume of chilled sales increased by 0.7 percent to 151,599 MT, with average prices across the category of GBP 13.87 (USD 18.12, EUR 16.03) per kilogram and GBP 3.39 (USD 4.43, EUR 3.92) per unit, down 0.8 percent and 1.5 percent, respectively.
Meanwhile, the value of the frozen seafood category increased by 0.7 percent to GBP 737.3 million (USD 963.1 million, EUR 852.1 million), and ambient seafood sales grew by 2.2 percent to GBP 440.4 million (USD 575.3 million, EUR 509 million). The volumes sold in frozen and ambient both decreased by 2.4 percent to 101,369 MT and 60,451 MT, respectively.
The average price of frozen seafood for the 12 months increased by 3.2 percent to GBP 7.27 (USD 9.50, EUR 8.40) per kilogram, and by 1.7 percent per unit to GBP 2.61 (USD 3.41, EUR 3.02). Ambient seafood prices increased by 4.7 percent per kilogram to GBP 7.29 (USD 9.52, EUR 8.43) and 2.6 percent per unit to GBP 1.71 (USD 2.23, EUR 1.98).
Frozen and ambient sales accounted for 22.5 percent and 13.4 percent of the U.K. retail market value, respectively.
In terms of the species sold across all categories, the U.K. retail market is led by salmon with sales approaching GBP 930 million (USD 1.2 billion, EUR 1.1 billion) for the aforementioned 12 months, up 1.3 percent year-on-year. In volume terms, sales increased to 53,583 MT, up 4.7 percent, and 232.4 million units.
Cod and tuna followed with sales values of GBP 410.6 million (USD 536.5 million, EUR 474.7 million) and GBP 335.9 million (USD 439 million, EUR 388.3 million), respectively.
In terms of retail prices, salmon fell by 3.2 percent to GBP 17.35 (USD 22.67, EUR 20.05) per kilogram, while cod was up 3.7 percent to GBP 8.78 (USD 11.47, EUR 10.15) and tuna climbed by 6.7 percent to GBP 7.44 (USD 9.72, EUR 8.60).
With 22.5 percent of the total sales value, Tesco continued to be the country’s leading seafood retailer, followed by Sainsbury’s with 14.7 percent and discounter Aldi with 10.6 percent. Aldi was the only one of the top three to grow its market share over the 12 months.
