The good news is that we finished the year on a high note with an extra £7 in our basket. The bad news is we have lost since we bought the shares last December.
But we've done pretty well considering the state of the stock market. The FTSE has dropped 20% over the year compared with a fall of only 7.64% in our shares.
Looking back over the last 12 months, our basket hit a heady £1,106 in May and fell to its lowest point last month at £863. Now it is back up to a more promising £870.
With the exception of Somerfield, which saw an unfortunate slide in its share price but has now picked up again, most of our retailers and manufacturers have held fairly steady this year.
Our manufacturers have fared better on average. ABF is up 8.53% and Northern Foods is up 5.59% this year while Sainsbury has dropped 21.9% and Safeway is down 34.4%.
ABF is doing pretty well at the moment although it has not been enough to push up its share price, which fell 28p this month despite the announcement of its full-year profit being up 9% to £430m.
Northern Foods saw pre-tax profit up 1% to £38.8m.
David Hallam at Williams de Broë said defensive growth companies like those in our basket had underperformed over the last month, although there had been a slight swing back recently. He added: "Going into the new year, the defensive growth companies will be the place to be."
December is a quiet month with no more results apart from a pre-closed statement from Unilever on the 18th, with all our companies probably concentrating on getting their share of the Christmas sales instead.
But should we hang on to our basket of shares? Dave Stoddart at Teather & Greenwood said we should feel pleased with how we have done but warned that views on next year's economy were more downbeat. "The consumer cannot carry on spending at the current rate.
"There are some tax increases that will become effective in April and concern about house price inflation. If rising interest rates happen, there could be a slowdown in people's spending then retail shares don't tend to do particuarly well."
We'll hang in there, and plan to keep you posted with regular updates next year.
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But we've done pretty well considering the state of the stock market. The FTSE has dropped 20% over the year compared with a fall of only 7.64% in our shares.
Looking back over the last 12 months, our basket hit a heady £1,106 in May and fell to its lowest point last month at £863. Now it is back up to a more promising £870.
With the exception of Somerfield, which saw an unfortunate slide in its share price but has now picked up again, most of our retailers and manufacturers have held fairly steady this year.
Our manufacturers have fared better on average. ABF is up 8.53% and Northern Foods is up 5.59% this year while Sainsbury has dropped 21.9% and Safeway is down 34.4%.
ABF is doing pretty well at the moment although it has not been enough to push up its share price, which fell 28p this month despite the announcement of its full-year profit being up 9% to £430m.
Northern Foods saw pre-tax profit up 1% to £38.8m.
David Hallam at Williams de Broë said defensive growth companies like those in our basket had underperformed over the last month, although there had been a slight swing back recently. He added: "Going into the new year, the defensive growth companies will be the place to be."
December is a quiet month with no more results apart from a pre-closed statement from Unilever on the 18th, with all our companies probably concentrating on getting their share of the Christmas sales instead.
But should we hang on to our basket of shares? Dave Stoddart at Teather & Greenwood said we should feel pleased with how we have done but warned that views on next year's economy were more downbeat. "The consumer cannot carry on spending at the current rate.
"There are some tax increases that will become effective in April and concern about house price inflation. If rising interest rates happen, there could be a slowdown in people's spending then retail shares don't tend to do particuarly well."
We'll hang in there, and plan to keep you posted with regular updates next year.
{{INSIGHT }}
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