Shoppers made 497 million trips to the supermarket over the period (PA) (PA Archive)Grocery price inflation has slowed to its lowest rate since December 2024 as the World Cup and heatwaves drove the highest number of supermarket trips in more than five years. Supermarket prices were 2.6% higher than a year ago over the four weeks to July 12, a significant slowing from June's 3% and the lowest rate since December 2024, figures from Worldpanel by Numerator show. However, shoppers made 497 million trips to the supermarket over the four weeks, an average of 17 per household, and the highest figure recorded since March 2020. Sainsbury's also gained market share, moving from 15.1% last year to 15.2% in the last 12 weeks, with sales growing by 2.8%, while sales at Tesco were up by 1.7% with a market share of 27.9%. While sales at Asda were down 1.1% on last year, this was an improvement on the 3.6% drop reported last month.