Morrisons shoppers stockpile loo roll

The boss of Morrisons today said he has seen sales of painkillers and lavatory paper spike as some shoppers stockpile before Brexit.

Dave Potts said: “We’ve seen quite a pick-up — high single digit — in painkillers and toilet rolls. Whether that’s got any bearing on how people are feeling about Brexit, I don’t know.”

But he added it was “a very small amount”.

Potts’s comments came as Morrisons — Britain’s fourth-biggest supermarket — said it was confident about its future despite facing increasing competition from German discounters Aldi and Lidl.

It posted an 8.6% rise in pre-tax profits and is paying another special dividend, its third in a year. Revenues increased 2.7% to £17.7 billion, with same-store sales up 4.8% for the year to end of February 3.

Retail same-store sales were up 1.5%, and growth in its wholesale business, which supplies corner shops chain McColl’s and Amazon, was up 3.3%.

The City had been speculating that Morrisons, whose stores are mostly in the North, would be eyeing some of the shops that Asda and Sainsbury’s were expected to dispose of in the South as part of their £13 billion merger. But that deal now looks dead.

Potts said Morrisons’ “turnaround isn’t predicated on anyone else’s deal”.

Brexit fears have prompted one in 10 shoppers to start stockpiling food, research firm Kantar Worldpanel said.