Fashion retailer Joules has seen group revenue increase by 18.4 per cent year-on-year to £185.9 million, driven by strong growth from its e-commerce channels.

The UK brand’s annual report for the year to 27 May showed that retail revenue was up by 15.9 per cent to £129.7 million, reflecting growth from stores and online, with e-commerce revenue increasing by 28 per cent to represent 38.4 per cent of total retail revenue – up from 34.8 per cent in 2017.

“We have continued to invest in our e-commerce platform, including enhancements to digital content, payment and delivery propositions, as well as in targeted customer marketing which has helped us to grow visitor numbers and improve conversion rates,” read the report. “Mobile is now the most important e-commerce channel for our customers, with traffic from a mobile device (including tablets) representing around three-quarters of total traffic.”

Chief executive Colin Porter put this down to the ‘Total Retail’ approach, which includes offering an increasingly seamless in-store/online experience, through services such as Click and Collect and order-in-store fulfillment, in-store returns and exchanges for e-commerce orders and consistent cross-channel communications and promotions.

“We expect to continue to increase the mix of e-commerce sales as a proportion of our total retail sales through ongoing enhancements to our e-commerce platform, the customer proposition and our customer relationship management capability,” he stated.

The report also noted Joules will leverage wholesale capabilities and relationships to support emerging retail channels such as online marketplaces and 'fulfilled by' models that offer new routes to reach the target customer base in the UK and internationally.

“We develop international markets via a wholesale model supported by e-commerce, leveraging our investment in our central creative and design functions, supply chain and infrastructure,” read the document. “Our priority markets are the US and Germany, where our brand and products are resonating well with our growing customer following.”

Poster added that while the challenges facing the wider UK retail sector are well documented, “the shift towards online shopping in combination with sector discounting, cost and consumer spending pressures is making life incredibly challenging for some retail businesses”.

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