Conspicuous corporate consumption was definitely out this Christmas, according to Majestic Wines chief executive Steve Lewis.

“There were far fewer parties, particularly in the City,” he said. “Corporate events which went ahead served sparkling wine rather than champagne and the kind of people who normally send a couple of bottles of bubbly to all their contacts were choosing to send a few bottles of still New World wine instead. It wasn't that they necessarily wanted to spend less, they just wanted to be seen as slightly more restrained in current financial markets.”

The result was Majestic saw the first drop in underlying sales over Christmas in recent years. Like-for-like sales fell 2.9% in the 10 weeks to
5 January due to lower sales to businesses with private customers' purchases modestly ahead of last year.

“Private customers stayed loyal to us in the face of utterly unprecedented heavy discounting by the supermarkets. Interestingly, sales of top-end champagnes like Veuve Cliquot, Tattinger and Bollinger held up very well. Customers were buying those for their own consumption but then opting for good quality but cheaper sparkling wines when they were throwing parties. So the slight decline in champagne sales to punters was more than made up for by sales of the sparkling wines.”

Lewis said the group's total sales, including new outlets, were ahead of last year and despite the gruelling competition from the supermarkets Majestic had gone through the key run-up to Christmas without indulging in massive discounting which would have damaged its margins.

The shares slipped 41/2p to 129p.