Douglas has quintupled its net profit, while also adding 9 % to its sales thanks to both physical and online growth. For next year, the chain counts on further growth through new stores.
Foundation for further growth
Douglas is thriving under CEO Sander van der Laan’s “Let it Bloom” strategy: in its broken fiscal year 2023/24 (which ended in September) sales rose 8.7 %, driven by growth in both physical shops (+ 8.2 %) and e-commerce (+ 9.8 %). Adjusted EBITDA rose 11.4 % to 808.6 million euros, resulting in a slight margin improvement. Particularly impressive was the retailer’s net profit hike from 16.7 million euros to 84 million euros.
In the fourth quarter, profit went up to 71.8 million euros above zero, coming from 28.2 million euros in the red a year earlier. Quarterly revenue rose 8.7 % to 959.9 million euros. Van der Laan stated that the results provided a strong foundation for further growth, and that they strengthened the group’s “leading market position”.
54 new stores
Last year, Douglas added 54 shops to its network, while closing twenty others and relocating or renovating 144 locations. In the DACHNL region (Austria, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland and The Netherlands), sales rose 10.7 % to just over two billion euros. However, the chain does not release country-by-country figures.
For the current financial year 2024/25, Douglas expects sales to grow to between 4.7 and 4.8 billion euros and net profit to multiply again, to 225 to 265 million euros, thanks to operational efficiency gains and debt repayments following the IPO this year. New shop openings in Antwerp, Berlin and Salzburg are also already planned.
