Zalando's substantial marketing investment bears fruit

Despite a high comparison base, German online fashion platform Zalando managed to grow strongly again in the second quarter. The platform now has 44.5 million active customers, 30 % more than a year earlier.

Customer base grows by 30 %

Between 1 April and 30 June, Zalando’s gross trading volume and turnover rose by 40 % and 34.3 %, respectively. The platform attributes the growth to intensive customer acquisition, the strong performance of the partner programme and a successful end-of-season sale. Also, due to the prolonged lockdowns in several European countries (including Germany), customers continued to shop primarily online.

At the end of the reported period, Zalando had 44.5 million active customers, an increase of more than 30 % compared to the same period last year. The platform not only saw the number of customers increase, but their order frequency reached a new record level as well.

Marketing pays off

In the first half of the year, the total turnover increased by 39.7 % to 4.97 billion euros. However, due to the heavy investments made to attract new customers, the profit was somewhat lower than a year ago. The operating result fell from 198.4 million euros to 186.4 million euros, almost entirely due to higher marketing expenditure. Operating profit tripled to 264.9 million euros.

Zalando is still expecting sales growth of between 26 % and 31 % for the whole financial year. The adjusted operating profit should fall in the upper half of the range from 400 to 475 million euros.