Sainsbury’s has seen an end to nine-years of quarterly sales growth, as budget supermarkets continued to take a bite out of the mainstream grocery market.

Although it maintained its own market share at 17%, the second-largest UK supermarket said today that total sales in its fourth quarter were down 1.5%, down 3.8% on a like-for-like basis.

The results were influenced by tough comparatives from last year, when Sainsbury’s saw its sales benefit from the discovery of horsemeat in some branded and competitors' products.

Justin King, chief executive, said, “The market is now growing at its slowest rate since 2005, with falling food inflation in particular benefiting customers. The later timing of Easter and Mother's Day, which fall in quarter one of our new financial year, and unseasonable weather have also contributed to lower market growth year-on-year.

“Although some economic indicators are showing an improvement in the health of the economy, we expect the outlook for customers to continue to be challenging for the coming year. We remain confident that our differentiated offer, supported by 'value for values', Nectar data and Brand Match, will allow us to outperform our peers in the year ahead.”