Zalando, Europe’s largest dedicated online fashion retailer, has lifted its forecast for sales and profit growth for 2015 after an early start to the spring and less discounting drove a strong first quarter.
The company, which was quick to deliver better-than-expected preliminary results last month, said it now expects full-year sales to rise at the top end or slightly above the 20-25% corridor it had previously predicted.
The company founded in 2008, only began making a profit at the end of last year, continues to see an increase in the number of active customers. Zalando‘s websites registered 393m visitors in the first quarter of 2015, with more visits from mobile devices than from desktop devices.
Management board member Ruben Ritter said the rise was driven by an early start to spring as well as less discounting than a year ago due to Zalando becoming more nimble in responding to trends like booming demand for sneakers.
“In the second quarter, the positive momentum continues,” he told a conference call for journalists, adding he expected that the period would also be helped by the imminent launch of sales on its site of garments from U.S. chain Gap.
The Berlin based firm, which now ships 1,500 brands to customers in 15 countries, said that it expects to increase its staff to about 10,000 by the end of 2015 from around 8,000 now, hiring particularly in the tech and logistics divisions of the business.
