Asos raises sales forecast following strong year
Online fashion retailer Asos has reported a 145% uplift in full year pre-tax profit to £80 million as it increased its sales forecast for the year ahead.
In the year to 31 August, retail sales climbed by 34% to £1.9 billion as the company achieved UK growth of 16%. International growth was even stronger at 47%, or 36% at constant currency, as overseas sales accounted for 63% of total retail sales compared to 57% in the previous year.
Nick Beighton, Asos chief executive, said: “It’s been a great year for Asos, with continued growth in sales and profits. Our international performance was excellent, as we reinvested FX tailwinds and benefitted from our continually improving customer proposition. In a competitive UK market, we achieved strong full price performance whilst further increasing market share.”
During the year, Asos upped the pace of investment in both technology and implementation. At the start of the year, the retailer completed the roll out of a new digital platform that delivers micro-service architecture with fully native mobile experience in android and iOS apps and a “vastly improved” new checkout.
Beighton added: “We ramped up our investment in building the increasingly strong and differentiated Asos proposition. Our new agile technology platform is allowing us to accelerate our pace of innovation with great benefits for our customers, including new payment methods and additional language sites to come.”
Asos also continued to increase capacity and efficiency at its Barnsley warehouse, completed the transition to phase one of its new Eurohub 2 fulfilment centre, and signed a lease for a new fulfilment centre in the US, which is expected to be operational by atumn 2018.
The company said total orders shipped reached 49.6 million in the period to mark a 30% increase year-on-year.
Asos now expects full year sales growth of 25% to 30% in the year ahead compared to its medium term sales guidance of 20% to 25%.
Looking ahead, Beighton said: “The new financial year shows continuing momentum in the business. The potential for our company remains huge. We are confident we are positioning Asos to be the world’s number one destination for fashion loving twentysomethings”
