Price-conscious customers eat into Douglas’s profits

Price-conscious customers left the German perfumery chain Douglas dealing with a decline in profits in its day-to-day buying and selling over the Christmas interval.

According to preliminary figures, gross sales within the first monetary quarter to the top of December rose 1.7% 12 months on 12 months to 1.67 billion euros, the corporate mentioned in Düsseldorf on Monday. However, the working margin earlier than curiosity, taxes, depreciation, amortisation, and particular gadgets (adjusted EBITDA) was solely 19.9%. A 12 months earlier, this margin was 21.5%. Analysts, on common, had anticipated 20.8% this time.

Douglas attributed the event to buyers paying shut consideration to costs when making purchases. While the important thing “Singles’ Day” and “Black Week” promotions carried out comparatively properly, in addition they introduced ahead purchases for Christmas.

Douglas CEO Sander van der Laan continues to count on gross sales of 4.65 to 4.8 billion euros for the present monetary 12 months to the top of September. The adjusted working margin is predicted to be round 16.5%. The SDax-listed firm plans to publish its ultimate figures for the primary monetary quarter on February 11.