Transformational year for Sosandar with first annual pre-tax profit

Sosandar, the Wilmslow-based online women’s fashion brand, has reported its first annual pre-tax profit since its foundation in 2015.

In the year ended March 31, 2023, it reported revenues of £42.5m, a 44% improvement, and a pre-tax profit of £1.6m, which is a £2.2m positive swing versus the previous year’s loss.

It had net cash of £10.6m at the year end, up from £7m the previous year, following strong trading and an oversubscribed fund raise in February 2023.

During the reporting period total orders increased by 22% to 621,000 and active customers increased 19% to 265,000.

Trading with its now well-established third-party partners, including Next and Marks and Spencer, has been extremely strong, the business said, with a record quarter for the group delivered through third parties in the third quarter of fiscal year 2023, followed by a strong fourth quarter.

There was also a successful initial online launch of its partnership with J Sainsbury’s, which is currently performing in line with expectations and the in-store roll-out of the curated collection is on track for launch in September 2023.

Sosandar has reported a strong start to the first quarter of its new financial year, with revenue of £11.4m, up 10% against a strong prior year comparator, with the impact of strategic initiatives to come through in the second half.

Global-e is set to go live this month, allowing the company to transact and fulfil orders worldwide in a cost-effective manner.

The business is currently trading in line with market expectations reflecting a strong performance on both its own site and through third-party partners.

A mobile app is currently in user testing and is expected to launch in the second quarter of the current financial year.

The business has also signed a new third-party wholesale partnership with Freemans, part of the Otto Group, to begin in September 2023.

Cash at June 30, 2023 stood at £10m, reflecting further investment in inventory and continued strong trading.

Sosandar believes that market expectations for the year ending March 31, 2024 are currently revenue of £57m, and a pre-tax profit of £2.8m.

Co-CEOs, Ali Hall and Julie Lavington, said: “We are delighted to report on what has been a transformational year for Sosandar.

“Despite the challenging macroeconomic backdrop, we have seen increasing demand for our products across all categories with strong trading across both Sosandar.com and through our third party partners.

“The sustained growth in revenue and profitability throughout the period is testament to our ability to deliver a unique quality product offering and highly effective marketing strategy, that resonates with our customer base.

“Our success to date would not be possible without the commitment and dedication of our team and we would like to take this opportunity to extend our appreciation to all of our staff for their hard work during the year.”

They added: “As Sosandar continues to grow, we remain committed to investing in our product range to offer our customers an ever-growing variety of on-trend, affordable, long lasting, lifestyle appropriate clothes. We are delighted to report that demand for our fast-tracked product range has continued to increase with knitwear, formal tailoring, coats, partywear, summer occasion wear and swim and beach wear all performing particularly well during the year.

“Our third-party partnerships continue to perform extremely well and we were delighted to become an omnichannel retailer through our partnership with Sainsbury’s.

“The partnership will accelerate growth in our market share and the awareness of our brand as we provide our large, but underserved demographic with more opportunities to purchase our unique and diverse products. We are also excited that we will imminently be able to transact and fulfil orders worldwide through our agreement with Global-e which is set to go live this month, providing women across the globe with access to our unique and diverse product range.

“The momentum built throughout FY23 has continued into FY24 with current trading in line with expectations. We are very excited for the opportunity available to us in FY24 and beyond as we deploy the money raised from our over-subscribed equity fundraise in January 2023 to support our growth both in the UK and internationally.”