Naked Wines first-half revenues surge as lockdowns boost demand

(Sharecast News) - Naked Wines upgraded its full-year sales growth expectations on Thursday and reported an 80% jump in first-half revenues as wine orders were boosted by Covid-19 lockdowns.
In the 26 weeks to 28 September, revenues surged to £157.1m from £87.5m in the same period a year ago. The company hailed a strong performance across all of its markets, with revenue in the US and the UK up 95% and 76%, respectively, while Australia saw growth of 48%.

New customer sales were up 166% during the half, while repeat customer sales rose 66%.

The company's adjusted pre-tax loss narrowed to £2.7m from £5m a year earlier. The statutory loss for the period came in at £8.1m, up £2.7m on last year, mainly due to a non-cash write-down, it said.

"Whilst the strength of our business is clear in our first half performance, arguably the most important consequence of the pandemic has been the rapid acceleration of demand online in the wine category, most notably in the US market, which is where we believe the group will add the most substantial value in the future," the company said.

"The pandemic has combined this with a period of people being more frequently at home, looking for safer and more convenient ways to buy the things they want. Quite simply, many customers did not know they could order wine online, to be delivered to their door, until Covid-19 motivated them to look, and they are now embracing it."

Naked Wines said positive trading momentum has continued into the start of the second half but it is mindful of significant levels of political and economic uncertainty.

"The many scale achievements are seen as enduring and based on our central case assumptions we are upgrading expected sales growth to +55-65% for the current year."