Calendar An icon of a desk calendar. Cancel An icon of a circle with a diagonal line across. Caret An icon of a block arrow pointing to the right. Email An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of the Facebook "f" mark. Google An icon of the Google "G" mark. Linked In An icon of the Linked In "in" mark. Logout An icon representing logout. Profile An icon that resembles human head and shoulders. Telephone An icon of a traditional telephone receiver. Tick An icon of a tick mark. Is Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes. Is Not Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes with a diagonal line through it. Pause Icon A two-lined pause icon for stopping interactions. Quote Mark A opening quote mark. Quote Mark A closing quote mark. Arrow An icon of an arrow. Folder An icon of a paper folder. Breaking An icon of an exclamation mark on a circular background. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Caret An icon of a caret arrow. Clock An icon of a clock face. Close An icon of the an X shape. Close Icon An icon used to represent where to interact to collapse or dismiss a component Comment An icon of a speech bubble. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Ellipsis An icon of 3 horizontal dots. Envelope An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Home An icon of a house. Instagram An icon of the Instagram logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. Magnifying Glass An icon of a magnifying glass. Search Icon A magnifying glass icon that is used to represent the function of searching. Menu An icon of 3 horizontal lines. Hamburger Menu Icon An icon used to represent a collapsed menu. Next An icon of an arrow pointing to the right. Notice An explanation mark centred inside a circle. Previous An icon of an arrow pointing to the left. Rating An icon of a star. Tag An icon of a tag. Twitter An icon of the Twitter logo. Video Camera An icon of a video camera shape. Speech Bubble Icon A icon displaying a speech bubble WhatsApp An icon of the WhatsApp logo. Information An icon of an information logo. Plus A mathematical 'plus' symbol. Duration An icon indicating Time. Success Tick An icon of a green tick. Success Tick Timeout An icon of a greyed out success tick. Loading Spinner An icon of a loading spinner. Facebook Messenger An icon of the facebook messenger app logo. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Facebook Messenger An icon of the Twitter app logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. WhatsApp Messenger An icon of the Whatsapp messenger app logo. Email An icon of an mail envelope. Copy link A decentered black square over a white square.

Sunny days: Royals and heat help supermarkets

Royal fans gather in Windsor, ahead of the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle in St George's Chapel at Windsor Castle. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Picture date: Saturday May 19, 2018. See PA story ROYAL Wedding. Photo credit should read: Damir Sagolj/PA Wire
Royal fans gather in Windsor, ahead of the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle in St George's Chapel at Windsor Castle. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Picture date: Saturday May 19, 2018. See PA story ROYAL Wedding. Photo credit should read: Damir Sagolj/PA Wire

British supermarkets were boosted by the royal wedding and warm weather over the last three months with Asda and Morrisons outperforming their bigger rivals.

Latest figures show grocery sales were up 2.7% on last year over the 12 weeks to May 20.

Consumer panel Kantar Worldpanel attributed the growth to the “recent hot weather combined with the Meghan Markle effect”.

There was a particularly noticeable spike in sales on the Friday before the wedding and the FA Cup Final, with grocers seeing ÂŁ415 million through their tills across the 24 hours.

Chris Hayward, consumer specialist at Kantar Worldpanel, said: “The sun shone on the grocery market over the past month with record-breaking temperatures, a bank holiday weekend and royal wedding fever all contributing to a bumper period.”

Barbecue lovers increased sales of burgers and sausages over the last month as they rose by 39% and 12% respectively, while non-alcoholic beer sales jumped by 64%.

More than 16.6 million households bought ice creams, while sun care sales were up 64% on this time last year.

Kantar Worldpanel said the country’s second biggest grocer Sainsbury’s, who last month announced it was to merge with Asda, posted the lowest sales growth and continued to lose market share.

Sales were up 1% year-on-year, although its market share fell back by 0.2 points.

Morrisons performed particularly well over the quarter with sales growth 2.9% ahead of the overall market, and Asda enjoyed growth of 2.8%.

Sales were up at the country’s biggest grocer Tesco by 2.2% on the back of an extra 170,000 customers coming through its doors, despite dropping market share by 0.1 percentage points to 27.7%.

Mike Watkins, analysts Nielsen’s UK head of retailer insight, said: “This growth is well ahead of inflation, indicating that despite any underlying concerns shoppers may have around balancing the monthly household budget, they are willing to spend on food and drink.

According to Nielsen, Asda had the most improved year-on-year sales growth of the top four supermarkets at 3.3% over the 12 weeks to May 19, followed by Morrisons (2.6%).