Asda said it enjoyed a good performance at Christmas both in store and online, after a record 4.8 million customers shopped with the supermarket on 23rd December.

The grocer is not scheduled to release its trading figures for its fourth quarter until 20 February; however it is confident that using a gimmick-free strategy for Christmas this year was the right decision for the company.

A spokesperson said "Our strategy was to focus on gimmick-free, simple, every day low price transparency for our customers and to hold our nerve when it came to the sales."

"This was against the backdrop of many other retailers vouchering heavily and starting their sales early and resulted in us seeing record footfall over the Christmas period."

Asda also said that it had its biggest ever online Christmas, with grocery home shopping sales on 21 and 22 December exceeding £5m for the first and second time.