X5 Group reports five-fold increase in online sales
Russian retail giant X5 reports a 470% increase in online sales in the space of one year. Total revenue in the year up to April 2020 amounted to €21.3 million, making the X5 Retail Group the number-one online grocery delivery company in Russia, according to Retail News. In April 2020, online sales represented 2% of X5’s turnover in Moscow, the Moscow region and St Petersburg, where online services are available. At the end of the month, X5 was delivering more than 23,000 orders per day, with the number continuing to grow.
X5’s CEO, Igor Shekhterman, said,
“During the quarantine designed to combat the spread of the COVID-19 virus in Russia and introduced for the period from March 21 to on May 11, our consumers more than ever need safe ways to get food to feed their households without having to visit a store. In the largest cities where we operate, we at X5 have been able to offer our fellow citizens two convenient ways to meet this demand: first by stocking up via our online supermarket (in Moscow, the Moscow region and St Petersburg), which offers a wide assortment of food, household goods, personal hygiene products, children’s goods and pet supplies; second with express delivery from a nearby Pyaterochka store (176 outlets in Moscow and Kazan), with deliveries completed in 1.5-2 hours based on the assortment of our standard proximity store.”
Since 2017, X5 Retail Group has been investing in expanding infrastructure for its online platforms, including the commissioning of four dark stores, a fleet of 283 delivery trucks, as well as the IT infrastructure and user interfaces for online operations. The group’s plans for 2020 include launching Perekrestok.ru in Nizhny Novgorod in the summer, based on an innovative solution of transforming a former Karusel hypermarket into a dark store. This will be Russia’s first fully fledged online food retail platform boasting a wide product range, including fresh produce, offered in regional markets outside Moscow and St Petersburg. By the end of 2020, X5 plans to scale up its express delivery service while continuing to refine the efficiency of business processes in order to increase market share in this segment and to achieve break-even sooner. In addition, X5 plans to launch express delivery from Perekrestok stores using the new Perekrestok.Bystro mobile app.
