Lagging behind competitors like Checkers Sixty60 and Pick n Pay asap!, Woolies Dash is finally seeing some invigorating growth. Woolworths’ online sales through the delivery app has grown 26 percent in the second half of the year, and its making up almost 4 percent of its total sales in South Africa.
Read: Waymo is creating real-time weather maps with its self-driving taxis
Despite the challenges it is facing with load-shedding and a economic turndown, the company’s food business has been seeing strong growth.
“The Food business improved its run-rate through the period, growing turnover and concession sales by 7.3% and by 5.1% on a comparable store basis,” Woolworths reported. “This was notwithstanding the considerable disruption caused by load-shedding, which has had a pronounced impact on our predominantly fresh categories across the business, in terms of foregone sales, increased waste, and significant increases in diesel costs required to support trade during the extended power outages.”
The Fashion Beauty Home business of Woolworths has also turned in pleasing results, with turnover and concession sales growing by 11 percent and online clothing sales grew by 1.5 percent and contributed 4 percent of South African sales.
“The focus on improving the underlying financial health of our respective business in Fashion, Beauty and Home continues to deliver positive results with full-priced sales growing by 15.2 percent for the period, and clearance sales down over 20 percent in South Africa, following the smallest and most profitable winter sale to date,” it said.
“Price movement averaged 11.1 percent and remains positively impacted by the successful implementation of our markdown reduction strategies.”
“The annualised impairment rate for the four months ended 31 October 2022 increased to 6.2 percent, compared to 4.1 percent in the prior period, due to the growth in new accounts as well as the increased financial pressure felt by consumers,” it said.
