Loss for Zalando despite decent turnover growth

40 % turnover growth

First the good news: Zalando’s turnover grew 41 to 43 % over the past quarter, it says in a quarterly update. Over the past three months, Zalando’s sales reached 707 to 717 million euro, thanks to an increasing number of customers. The exact growth will however only be announced in November.

Zalando managed its first profit in 2014, but it is back to onerous ways now: its EBITDA was a 18 to 32 million euro loss, but CEO Rubin Ritter is not worried. “The results are in line with our strategy to invest into long-term growth. In the third quarter we saw unique growth opportunities to significantly beat our growth targets and tapped into these with full conviction. We remain committed to our profitable growth path, but are willing to trade in some profitability to accelerate our growth and gain market share.”

Zalando, active in 15 different European countries, has altered its forecast on the back of this quarterly update: the turnover forecast was adjusted upwards and its profit forecast was adjusted downwards. It now expects turnover to grow 33 to 35 % (up from 28 to 31 %) and profit to grow 3 to 4 % (down from 4.5 %).