Department store group John Lewis Partnership posted higher festive sales but supermarket arm Waitrose took a tumble.
The employee-owned company said total sales at the partnership, which includes the eponymous department stores and Waitrose, rose 4.1% in the six weeks to Saturday January 2 to £1.81bn.
But Waitrose like-for-like sales fell 1.4%, although gross sales excluding fuel increased 1.2% to £859.8mln against last year.
The partnership said the supermarket chain's peak trade came particularly late this year and was more concentrated than usual in the days before Christmas.
Waitrose had record trading days on December 23 and Christmas Eve, with sales up 6% and 5.5% respectively.
Chairman Charlie Mayfield said: "This has been a strong Christmas trading period for the partnership despite the non-food market seeing significant shifts in trade patterns and the grocery market continuing to be challenging."
The news is likely to be viewed as evidence that discounters such as Aldi and Lidl are now making inroads into the business of Waitrose as well as the big four established supermarkets Tesco (LON:TSCO), Sainsbury's (LON:SBRY), Morrisons (LON:MRW) and Walmart-owned Asda.
John Lewis gross sales were £951.3m, up 6.9% compared with last year and up 5.1% on a like-for-like basis.
The group described department store trading as another very strong performance with impressive growth across fashion, home and technology.
That contrasted with a downbeat trading statement from fashion chain Next (LON:NXT) on Tuesday, which said sales had taken a hit from mild weather and online competition.