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Asda was cheapest on 15 items including ingredients for a caprese salad

Asda delivered the cheapest basket in a tightly fought competition for the first pricing survey of the new Grocer 33 year.

At £65.28, Asda’s basket was just 38p (0.6%) cheaper than Tesco’s. It’s a win, but it’s much closer than executive chairman Allan Leighton’s 5%-10% target.

As the UK sweltered in the heatwave, Asda provided the cheapest ingredients for a cooling caprese salad – its potted basil, vine tomatoes and Galbani mozzarella were all exclusively cheapest. In all Asda was exclusively cheapest on 15 products.

Tesco’s second place (£65.66) was powered by Clubcard promotions, including discounts that gave members the cheapest Ribena cartons, Philadelphia mini tubs and Yeo Valley kefir. Shoppers without a Clubcard would have paid a hefty £6.49 (9.9%) more.

Over at Sainsbury’s, value for money customer satisfaction is at an all-time high thanks to its Nectar Prices, CEO Simon Roberts told investors in a Q1 update this week. And with savings of £5.43, its £67.77 total offered the biggest year-on-year price reduction (5.3%). It was cheapest on the Starbucks Macchiato, Heck sausages and Sensodyne toothbrush. But it was £2.49 (3.6%) off the pace. 

The gap between Morrisons and Asda was more significant. Asda was £8.97 (12.1%) cheaper. Kiwis were the only cheapest item this week at Morrisons.

Waitrose was well off the pace with its £82.83 basket this week. It offered no exclusively cheapest items and was joint-cheapest on only two.

Across the basket the biggest rise was in Cravendale milk, up 20% year on year, followed by Starbucks Caramel Macchiato (19%) and Meridian almond butter (13%). The largest falls were for Kleenex tissues (–19%), coronation chicken sandwich filler (–16%) and vine tomatoes (–10%).