Tesco, Britain’s biggest retailer, has cemented its recovery, reporting its strongest quarterly sales performance in its home market in seven years despite rising prices.

Chief Executive Dave Lewis has been leading a fightback after Tesco’s profits were hammered by changing shopping habits, the rise of German discounters Aldi and Lidl and an accounting scandal in 2014.

He stabilised the business and then got it growing again with a focus on lower prices, new and streamlined product ranges, better customer service and much improved supplier relationships. Tesco remains Britain’s largest supermarket by a wide margin.

The group, which in January agreed to buy wholesaler Booker for £3.7 billion, said on Friday that UK like-for-like sales rose 2.3 per cent in the 13 weeks to May 27, a sixth straight quarter of growth.

The outcome was ahead of analysts’ forecasts, in a range of up 1.7 to two per cent, and built on growth of 0.7 per cent in the previous quarter.

“The key focus for this quarter has been working with our supplier partners to protect our customers from inflation. Today’s numbers show the benefit of our approach,” Lewis told reporters.

The performance was driven by 1.3 per cent growth in customer transactions, 10 million more year-on-year, and by volume growth in fresh food of 1.6 per cent.

Tesco shares rose as much as 4.4 per cent, but gave up those gains on wider concerns about a deteriorating consumer environment in Britain and lower international sales.

The stock is up 17 per cent year-on-year but down 13 per cent so far in 2017.

Britons have been hurt by a rise in inflation, caused in large part by the fall in the value of the pound since last year’s vote to leave the European Union, and by a slowdown in wages growth.

Tesco, which has a share of around 28 per cent of the UK grocery market, says it is not passing on as many cost increases to shoppers as its competitors.

By purchasing a tighter range of goods and working more closely with its suppliers, Tesco is able to exploit its huge purchasing scale.

Lewis said Tesco’s grocery inflation in the quarter was 1.5 percentage points below the most recent measure by industry researcher Kantar Worldpanel of 2.9 per cent.

“At the moment inflation in Tesco is significantly below the market trend,” he said.

Bernstein analyst Bruno Monteyne said Tesco’s inflation number “reflects working together with suppliers, not margin compression.”

Tesco’s finance chief Alan Stewart said the group’s margin and cost savings targets were unchanged after the update on the first quarter of its financial year.

Analysts regard Sainsbury’s, Britain’s second largest supermarket group, as the most exposed to a weaker economy after buying general merchandise retailer Argos.

Other analysts say the discounters remain a major threat to Tesco and its traditional rivals, highlighting renewed momentum at Aldi and Lidl, with recent industry data recording their fastest sales growth since 2015.

The trading update, released ahead of Tesco’s annual shareholders’ meeting later on Friday, showed group like-for-like sales rose one per cent.

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