The value of goods bought on e-retailer Cnova N.V.’s e-commerce sites in Brazil, France and other countries grew 2.5% in the third quarter.
Cnova is a Dutch e-retailer that is part of Groupe Casino, No. 7 in the Internet Retailer 2015 Europe 500. Cnova also is No. 2 in the Internet Retailer 2015 Latin America 500.
The depreciation of the Brazilian real caused a decline of 6.7% in overall net sales for the retailer. Without the currency fluctuation, Cnova said sales would have grown 9.1% year over year.
“After taking into account the strong negative impact (-15.1%) of the depreciation of the Brazilian real versus the euro, reported gross merchandise value of goods sold on Cnova sites grew by 2.5%,” the company said. At Cdiscount France, gross merchandise value increased 15.9%, while at Cnova Brazil it increased 18.1% on a constant-currency basis as “promotional pricing increased in response to aggressive competitor pricing,” the company said.
Cnova France is making a strong push into online marketplaces; the marketplace share of the total gross merchandise volume was 22.7% in the third quarter of 2015 compared to 12.4% in the third quarter of 2014. The marketplace share for Cdiscount France reached 29.8% and Cnova Brazil was 12.8%. As of September 30, 2015 the number of active marketplace sellers increased by 97% to 10,400 and the number of products offered in marketplaces grew to 26.0 million from 11.4 million a 129% increase, the company said.
To further expand its marketplaces Cnova announced a marketplace partnership with JD.com. JD.com products will be offered on the Cdiscount marketplace starting in December, but the company did not disclose further details.
Globally, Cnova has 21,700 click-and-collect points, which allows online customers to pick up purchases at local stores. In Brazil, the retailer is expanding its click-and-collect program and had more than 1,200 such points by the end of September. Because 65% of Cnova’s direct-sales customers choose click and collect, Cnova is expanding this option to marketplace vendors selling large items. Cnova says the new fulfillment service will be more attractive for vendors with large-item products and improve the marketplace.
Cnova also said it opened two new distribution centers in Brazil in September and one in France in the Paris area in October. Meanwhile, co-CEO Emmanuel Grenier said the company shut down e-commerce sites in Ecuador and Panama “because the activity was not ramping as well as we would have liked. So now we can devote our full attention in South America to Brazil and Colombia.”
In France the company sold Monshowroom, an apparel site for men, women and children, to Monoprix, a large French retail chain, because “we did not find the synergies we were hoping for with the rest of Cdiscount,” Grenier said.
For the three months ended Sept. 30, Cnova reported:
- Net sales of $781 million euros (US$860.27 million), down 6.7% from $837 million euros ($921.96 million) in the third quarter of fiscal 2014. On a constant-currency basis, net sales grew 9.1% year over year.
- Gross merchandise value, or the value of all merchandise sold on its marketplaces and e-retail sites, of $1.121 billion euros ($1.23 billion), a 2.5% increase from $1.094 million euros ($1.21 billion). On a constant currency basis, gross merchandise value increased 17.6%, Cnova said.
- Gross profit of $97 million euros ($106.9 million), down 14.2% from $113 million euros ($124.5 million).
- Site traffic generated by mobile devices increased to 40.2% compared to 27.4% in the third quarter of 2014. Half of the traffic at Cdiscount came from mobile devices in the quarter while nearly one-third of Cnova Brazil’s traffic came from mobile devices, the company said.
For the nine months ended Sept. 30:
Net sales of $2.53 billion euros ($2.72 billion), grew 6.75% year over year from $2.37 billion euros ($2.55 billion).