By Marcia Klein

Major retailers are all reporting significantly higher earnings and sales growth - which points to market share gains.

This makes it difficult to know who they might be taking market share away from.

This week saw the release of results from Mr Price and Foschini, both following closely on Edcon, whose earnings grew significantly.

Foschini, which reported for the year to March on Friday, increased headline earnings by 46% to 237.1c a share off an already high base in the previous two years.

Group managing director Dennis Polak said that while trading in the first half was challenging, all divisions - Foschini, @Home and American Swiss - exceeded expectations in the second half.

Since year-end, trading has remained buoyant and Foschini expects continued growth and the opening of more than 60 stores in the current year.

The growth in homeware is evident in the fact that @Home increased sales by 48%, helping to lift group turnover by 17% in the second half and by 13.6% to R4.4-billion for the year.

Earlier in the week, Mr Price said it grew headline earnings by 25% on a 14% rise in turnover to R4-billion, also on an improved second half.

Chief executive Alastair McArthur said the group, whose stores include Mr Price, The Hub and Miladys, "benefited from passing lower prices to consumers in a group deflation environment of 7%, with turnover increasing 14% to R4-billion".

A Mr Price market share gain of around 2.5% is deduced because, according to the Retail Liaison Committee, the industry reported 11.5% growth for clothing, foot wear and textile retailers overall.

McArthur said the benefits of lower interest rates had taken longer to come through in cash retailing (75% of turnover) and that improved trading conditions had been felt only from De cember.

Trading since has been excellent, except for May due to a late start to winter.

McArthur said that unit sales growth of 23% "confirms we gained many new customers who will stay with us for the long-term".