Shop Direct Group, the UK's leading online and home shopping retailer with brands including Very.co.uk, Littlewoods and isme, announces its full-year results for the 12-month period to 30th June 2012.
Financial Performance – all comparators are 12 months to 30th June 2011
- Group sales (excl. VAT) up 0.4% to £1,670m (2011 £1,664m)
- EBITDA increased by 66% to £108.9m (2011 £65.8m)
- Pre-tax losses narrowed by 27% to £57.7m (2011 £78.9m)
- Exceptional costs of £46.2m incurred +72% (2011 £26.9m)
Mark McMenemy, Group Finance & Product Director, said: "Despite the economic challenges, Shop Direct delivered a strong performance in 2011/12. We grew sales slightly despite increased pressures on customers, which demonstrate clearly the broad appeal of our brand, product and financial services offerings. By maintaining a clear focus on stock control, cash management and efficiency, we also ensured that we were able to mitigate the impact of increased promotional activity and significantly improve EBITDA performance during the year."
Operational Highlights
- Strong focus on efficiency, stock control and cash management
- Online growth of 6%, with 75% of total sales completed online during the year
- Continued double-digit growth of Very.co.uk and isme, buoyed by investment in own-brand labels and expansion of national brand portfolio
Current Overview
- Mobile transactions comprise 20% of all online sales with traffic up by 260% year-on-year and now comprising 30% of all website visits
- Collect+ network extended to 5,000 local stores, offering free next-day delivery and returns
- Myleene Klass fashion collection becomes the Group's fastest-ever selling celebrity range
Alex Baldock, Group Chief Executive Officer, said: "At Shop Direct, we provide a winning combination of fantastic products, value for money and accessible finance. These are great foundations to build on to create a best-in-class digital department store.
"One of the biggest opportunities we see is the increased customer demand for m-commerce, where we have real expertise. A third of our website traffic is now generated from mobile devices and that figure continues to grow rapidly across all of our brands. Looking ahead, we will start to see real incremental growth in sales from mobile as we continue to draw on our unparalleled knowledge of customer needs and shopping habits.
"In the short term, we're focused on delivering a superb Christmas. For the second year in a row, we expect tablet computers to be among our bestselling performers. And we've invested heavily in seasonal marketing, which is producing excellent results."
Shop Direct Group is one of the UK's leading online and home shopping retailers, with annual sales of £1.7 billion. Our brands include Very.co.uk, Littlewoods and isme and receive a total of more than 600,000 website visits every day.
