SUPERMARKET chain Sainsbury's has taken another battering in the store wars, falling behind rivals Tesco and Asda in the race to be the favourite place to shop for groceries.

A survey by retail research group Verdict found that Sainsbury's had slipped from the nation's second favoured supermarket chain into third place.

Tesco attracted the most shoppers, with 653 (22.4 per cent) of the consumers surveyed last month saying they mainly bought their groceries at its stores, ahead of Asda with 537 people (18.4 per cent) and Sainsbury's with 501 (17.1 per cent).

Following the top three were Safeway with 339 shoppers (11.6 per cent), Morrisons 157 (5.4 per cent) and Kwik Save 146 (5 per cent).

The survey's findings highlighted the impact U.S. giant Wal-Mart has had since it bought Asda last year and began slashing prices in an attempt to stir up competition in the sector and attract more customers.

The survey also found Asda attracted the highest loyalty rating among shoppers, ahead of Tesco and Sainsbury, while Safeway had the least loyal customers.

Verdict chairman Richard Hyman said Asda was the "star performer" in the study.

"Asda has closed the gap and it is growing significantly faster than Sainsbury's," he said. "Wal-Mart has set their ambitious targets of doubling Asda's profits in five years and Wal-Mart have a reputation for achieving what they set out to do."

Mr Hyman added that a key message from the survey, due to be released in full later this week, was that shoppers were no longer as loyal to a particular supermarket as in the past.

The number of customers loyal to a particular store fell from 75 per cent in 1998 year to 70 per cent last year, with most naming convenience and price as the driving forces behind which store they chose to shop at.

Waitrose came top for customer service and Marks & Spencer was singled out as providing the best quality.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.