Nisa’s latest three-week Cider Festival resulted in almost an extra £2m cider sales for the business – more than twice as much as last year’s – the independent buying group has reported.

The event produced sales totalling £1.84m from promoted lines, which provided a 126% sales uplift.

Nisa holds the cider festival to help retailers drive footfall and increase sales with competitive pricing on a wide selection of ciders, and offers such as 500ml bottles of Rekorderlig, Stella Cidre and Old Mout at three for £5.

Single-bottle fruit ciders such as Old Mout, Kopparberg and Rekorderlig fared particularly well during the festival which ran until 16 April.

Thatchers Gold 8-packs also proved a high flyer with sales up 126%, and Kingstone Press 12-packs saw sales grow by more than £48,000.

Sales of single bottles of premium ciders such as Friels First, Henry Westons Vintage and Thatchers Vintage Cider increased by more than 36%.

Leanne Jarrett, trading controller for beer, ales and cider at Nisa, said: “More of our members got involved with the event than ever before, which is really encouraging and supports the strength of the Nisa offer and our ability to deliver exciting and relevant promotional activity for our members and their customers.”