Ceconomy, Media Markt and Saturn’s parent company, revealed a small turnover growth for its first quarter, thanks to improved online sales. Expectedly, its profit did drop.
Lower profit
Ceconomy’s first quarter turnover reached 6.9 billion euro and that would represent a 0.6 % turnover and 1.3 % like-for-like turnover increase. Online turnover surged 12 % to 814 million euro, although Media Markt and Saturn performed even better, with a 22 % turnover spike. Ceconomy now generates 11.7 % of its turnover online, compared to 10.5 % last year. The goal is to continue that growth until it reaches at least 15 % of total turnover.
As anticipated with a profit alert issued in January, Ceconomy’s profit dropped. It achieved a 308 million euro EBIT last year, but in its first quarter, it only reached 258 million euro. “Our first quarter of the new fiscal year resulted in mixed feelings”, CEO Pieter Haas said. “Black Friday was the best sales day ever for MediaMarktSaturn, but on the other hand, our Christmas and December results were not as strong as we had hoped.”
To make up for that setback, Haas wants to cut costs even faster in the next few quarters. “We are still convinced we can reach our full-year targets”, Haas added.
