Russia's X5 Retail Group has reported a year-on-year sales growth of 8.1% in the first quarter of its financial year 2021, driven by a 6.4% growth in offline sales and a 1.7% from sales growth in digital businesses.
Net sales from offline channels amounted to RUB496.2 billion, with Perekrestok generating RUB82.8 billion (+5.4% year-on-year), followed by Pyaterochka at RUB403.5 billion (+9.1% year-on-year) and Karusel RUB9.7 billion (-45.3%)
Like-for-like (LFL) sales increased by 2.1%, with LFL basket driving LFL sales due to less frequent customer visits to stores and larger basket size.
Digital Business
The preliminary results for the quarter also revealed that the retailer's digital business saw year-on-year revenue growth of 363.5% to RUB10.5 billion.
Vprok.ru Perekrestok generated RUB4.5 billion (+114.3% year-on-year), while express delivery contributed RUB5.8 billion and 5Post (e-comm last mile) RUB 459 million.
The average number of total daily orders for Vprok.ru Perekrestok and express delivery services from Pyaterochka and Perekrestok stores exceeded 74,000 in peak days in March.
Quarterly Highlights
X5 added 252 new stores to its network in the first quarter of 2021 and renovated 425 proximity stores and one supermarket.
The company continued to downsize the Karusel chain as part of its hypermarket format transformation programme.
Food inflation in Q1 2021 accelerated to a quarterly average of 7.4% year-on-year from 5.8% in Q4 of 2020, peaking at 7.7% in February 2021.
It was mainly driven by fruit and vegetables, sugar, eggs and vegetable oil categories, influenced by the rising global soft commodities price inflation and the weaker rouble.
Consumer demand continued to recover and reached -1.1% year-on-year during the quarter compared to -3.8% year-on-year in the fourth quarter of 2020.
Unemployment decreased to 5.8% in this period, compared to 6.1% in the previous quarter.
X5 Retail Group operates proximity stores under the Pyaterochka banner, Perekrestok supermarkets, and Karusel hypermarkets. It offers omnichannel retailing through Vprok.ru Perekrestok, 5Post and Okolo. [Pic:©Blinow61/123RF.COM]
© 2021 European Supermarket Magazine – your source for the latest retail news. Article by Dayeeta Das. Click subscribe to sign up to ESM: The European Supermarket Magazine.
