Rising customer base and revenues fail to boost profits at ASOS
Online fashion destination ASOS has posted a ‘strong’ set of interim results for the six month period to 28 February 2014 with both active users and group revenues up by over a third year-on-year.
Group revenues totalled £481.7m, up from £359.7m over the same period in 2013, a 34 per cent increase whilst its active customer base meanwhile leapt 36 per cent to hit 8.2m.
Despite making this headway ASOS reported a 22 per cent decline in overall profits from 25.7m last year to £20.1m this year as an investment drive in IT and warehousing ate into margins.
Nick Robertson, CEO, commented: “This continued strong growth was achieved at the same time as acceleration in our investment in logistics, our IT platform and our overall customer offering, whilst also continuing to invest in our China start-up. Our £68 million investment during the current year will more than double the sales capacity with greatly enhanced efficiencies at our UK warehouse, a new Eurohub in Berlin, an expanded facility in Ohio in the US and a new warehouse in Shanghai.
“This increased pace of investment has reduced our profitability in the period, but will deliver significantly increased capacity as well as efficiencies in the longer term. ASOS is not and has never been about the short-term; the scale of the global opportunity remains as exciting as ever and we are investing for the many opportunities ahead."