Russia’s O’Key Group posted an underlying net retail revenue increase of 0.7% in the fourth quarter of its financial year, to RUB 45.68 billion (€600 million).
Like-for-like net retail revenue decreased by 2.7% for the period.
Its hypermarket operations saw revenue decrease by 1.3% in the quarter, as a result of the temporary closure of a hypermarket in Moscow, the group reported, as well as a weaker sales performance in October.
Net retail revenue in its Da! discounter operation was up 28.8% in the quarter, driven by a growth in traffic (+22.1%) and average basket size (+5.4%).
Implementing Initiatives
‘In the beginning of the reporting quarter, we initiated a number of initiatives aimed to improve logistics operations and planning, as well as [the] overall quality of fresh and ultra-fresh goods, what along with a partial easing of the macroeconomic environment, resulted in sequential pickup of sales in November and December,’ O’Key Group reported in a statement.
‘Growing competition in the retail sector with key competitors adding as much as 15% net retail space on [a] YoY basis remained the key growth constraint, resulting in [an] underlying O’Key revenue decrease by 1.3% YoY,’ it added.
For the full year, underlying net retail revenue fell by 1.1%, to RUB 159.38 billion (€2.11 billion).
Like-for-like sales for the full year were down 3.3%, driven by a 2.6% decrease in like-for-like traffic and a 0.6% decrease in average basket size.
As of 29 January 2019, O’Key Group operated 160 stores across Russia.
© 2019 European Supermarket Magazine – your source for the latest retail news. Article by Stephen Wynne-Jones. Click subscribe to sign up to ESM: European Supermarket Magazine.
