Sainsbury's invests £50m in value, holds price of Christmas roast

Grocery giant J Sainsbury announced the acceleration of its ‘value plan’ on Monday, investing a further £50m by March in a bid to battle the ‘cost-of-living’ crisis.

The FTSE 100 retailer, which reported a half-year underlying profit before tax of £340m in early November, said it understood Christmas would be “difficult” for many of its customers.

As a result, it said it was investing more than £15m to “specifically ensure” many holiday specialties would carry “amazing prices”.

Among the offers would be an “inflation-busting” Christmas roast dinner at “less than £4 a head”, as well as special offers and “low prices” on party food and puddings.

Sainsbury’s claimed it was holding the price of a “traditional fresh Christmas dinner” against last year.

The company said the move was in addition to its “biggest ever” September value offer, when it invested £65m in pricing through the autumn.

Sainsbury’s said it was doing “everything it can” to support customers with the skyrocketing cost-of-living, claiming that by March it would have invested more than £550m “in value” - the most it had ever spent on “battling price inflation” over a two-year period, and 10% more than the original £500m target it set in May.

“We really understand that millions of households are having to make really tough decisions this Christmas and our job is to do everything we can to help with the rising costs of living,” said chief executive officer Simon Roberts.

“We are accelerating our commitment to being the best value, investing a further £50m in lowering prices and doing everything we can to fight inflation and help our customers enjoy celebrating this year.

“We know everyone wants to enjoy a special Christmas meal together which is why we’re keeping inflation at bay and offering Christmas roast dinner for less than £4 per head - cheaper than it was last year.”

At 1301 GMT, shares in J Sainsbury were up 0.36% at 224.7p.

Reporting by Josh White for Sharecast.com.