Zalando SE ($ZAL)

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the publication of the Q1 Results 2026 Conference Call. I am George, the Chorus Call operator. [Operator Instructions] The conference is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] The conference must not be recorded for publication or broadcast. At this time, it's my pleasure to hand over to Patrick Kofler, Director, Investor Relations. Please go ahead, sir.

Good morning, and welcome to our Q1 2026 earnings call. Today, I'm joined by our co-CEO, Robert Gentz, and our CFO, Anna Dimitrova. Robert will kick off with a business update before handing over to Anna to walk you through the financial development of the quarter. Finally, Robert will discuss our outlook. Both will be available for questions afterwards. As usual, during the Q&A session, we kindly ask you to limit your questions to 2, allowing for an efficient discussion. This call is being recorded and both the live webcast and a replay will be available on our Investor Relations web page later today. Robert, over to you for the first slide.

Thank you, Patrick. Hello, and thank you for joining today's call. We've achieved significant milestones over the past year, and we continue to do so in Q1. We've successfully executed our strategy and met our financial goals, and we've made substantial progress again in the first 2 months of 2026. Progress across our team of apps to drive our platform's distribution, customer frequency and monetization depth. Progress as well with advancing our technology platform, which powers our B2C and B2B businesses. And progress with our AI capabilities to drive efficiency and growth for our business. Our addressable market is huge with EUR 500 billion in European fashion. So we relentlessly work on our strategy execution to achieve a larger coverage of this. Our Q1 performance was strong. It confirms that we are well on track with our full year targets, and it did another step towards growth. There are 5 key highlights that demonstrate our overall progress in Q1, which I will show you now on the next page. Number one, we've delivered a strong financial performance in Q1. At group level, we delivered strong double-digit growth. Reported GMV grew nearly 22%, and group revenue is up nearly 24% compared to Q1 last year. And we increased adjusted EBIT by 39% year-on-year to EUR 65 million. That brings our adjusted EBIT margin to 2.2%. Number two, as Q1, we have advanced our AI capabilities, bringing further traction to our -- to both our B2C and B2B business. We continue to be impressed by what benefits AI can rely to both efficiency and growth of our business. And I'll come back to some of our most exciting developments later in the call. Number three, in B2C, we delivered strong growth in Q1 across our team of consumer apps. We had a strong start into the spring/summer season. And ABOUT YOU and Lounge achieved even double-digit growth rates of GMV. In our core Apselando, our loyalty program or plus is a central engine to drive growth. We now have about 18.5 million members. We recently launched new exciting benefits by adding food delivery subscription as a partner benefit for our members. Number four, in B2B, we recorded continued strong double-digit growth. We are focus with the first set of partners in Norway, and we added 2 new sales channels. With this expansion, we now serve a total of 26 markets and 20 sales channels by ZEOS. And number 5, in summary, we're well on track to meet our full year targets. Despite the ongoing geopolitical instability and economic volatility in our markets, we confirm our 2026 guidance. So overall, I'm very happy with the performance of our team in the quarter. Now, I will first talk about the progress on the AI developments before Anna dives into the financial performance. So in March, during our full year update, we highlighted how our B2C and B2B segments are driven by shared data and infrastructure engine. That is now supercharged by AI. This engine is constantly getting back every day in every second. This continuous improvement is fueled by the growing engagement of consumers using our apps and as brands increasingly integrate with our ecosystem. We strategically drive the distribution and the usage frequency of our platforms across consumers and merchants. And the result of this expanding scale is an accumulation of more high-quality data, which in turn, continuously refines and improves our solutions. And AI is a powerful catalyst for both growth and efficiency. And we've successfully used data and algorithms to drive our business for over 15 years now. The recent years and months API capabilities have scale and the positive impact on our business has been accelerating. Let me give you a few examples of what we saw now in the recent months. So firstly, we are making great progress to evolve our AI-based assistant from a chat into a true lifestyle company at the forefront of Agentic commerce. The key reason milestone last quarter was the upgrade to provide advice beyond fashion. We now cover sports and very recently as well beauty advice. System for highly specific advice, for example, for hydrating and skin care or running shoe solver cremation, and these systems can now point you into very helpful directions. Numbers wise, an impressive 10 million customers last quarter have interacted with our AI assistance. And this is up from 6 million in the whole of 2025. So secondly, we now see how AI enhances the efficiency of our logistics backbone. We're proceeding with the rollout of AI-powered robots across our European fulfillment network. And already today, 2 million are being autonomously handled by our growing fleet of warehouse robots. And now, based on the early success through optimization and model training, we're rolling the impressive technology out across our network. This will improve throughput, scalability and efficiency of our entire fulfillment operators across Europe. And thirdly, we recently achieved impressive speed and quality increase in our partner article onboarding through AI. We introduced a computer vision solution that automatically detects incorrect image background or our scale. We also correct about 6,000 articles pictures daily and enriched missing material composition information through AI. As a result, up to 85% of articles are now ready to go online in less than 3 days. It is an impressive accomplishment in both speed and quality, and it reduces organizational coordination costs between us and the partners. So another great win-win through AI. Those are just 3 examples which demonstrate our continued traction of applying AI in our business, and I'm very much looking forward to sharing more -- many more of these examples with you in the future. Now I'd like to hand over to Anna for the financial performance.

Thank you, Robert, and good morning, everyone. As Robert already highlighted, we delivered strong financial performance in Q1. The reported increases in GMV and revenue are driven by solid underlying growth in Zalando and the inclusion of about. On a pro forma basis, we achieved strong GMV growth. GMV increased by 6% to EUR 4.3 billion. This growth was primarily driven by double-digit growth of our partner business of ABOUT YOU and Lounge by Zalando. As we have told you for many years, we see GMV growth as the key top line KPI for our business, and it is defined as the value of all merchandise sold by Zalando and by our partners to our customers. Revenue growth was a solid 3.4%, reaching EUR 3 billion, driven by both B2C and B2B. It was lower than the GMV growth because our partner business grew faster than Zalando Retail, and we don't account for those sales for our partner business, but only include the commissions we earn on these sales and revenues. Our focus on driving profitability is reflected in the increase of adjusted EBIT. On a reported basis, adjusted EBIT reached EUR 65 million, up 39% year-on-year. We have already delivered synergies of EUR 10 million in Q1, which contributed to this result. We are firmly on track to achieve EUR 40 million in synergies this year. In terms of profitability, group adjusted EBIT margin increased by 0.3 percentage points to 2.2% despite the dilution from the consolidation of ABOUT YOU. Zalando stand-alone adjusted EBIT margin improved year-on-year by 0.6 percentage points from 1.9% to 2.5%. ABOUT YOU generated positive adjusted EBIT after synergies, which is very significant progress. And the first time in its history, it generated positive adjusted EBIT in the first quarter. Our Q1 results demonstrate continued progress towards accelerating our financial performance across our entire business. Let me first focus on the strong top line performance of our B2C business. GMV saw strong growth across all 3 consumer apps on a reported basis and on a pro forma basis. Just like in Q2 -- or Q4, both ABOUT YOU and Lounge by Zalando, achieved double-digit growth rates. Growth in Zalando was driven by the acceleration of our partner business. Furthermore, we saw a successful start to the spring/summer season with particularly strong growth across several lifestyle categories like sports, kitchen, family and beauty. Pro forma revenue saw a moderate EUR 2.1 million increase to EUR 2.7 billion, reflecting the strategic shift in our business mix. This was driven by partner growth significantly outperforming retail across both Zalando and ABOUT YOU, a result of existing partners deepening their platform presence through expanded product assortments. The partner business share, Zalando stand-alone, is 36.6%, up 2.2 percentage points. However, the inclusion of ABOUT YOU diluted the overall group share to 31.8%. As we scale the partner business towards a target of 40% to 50% of total GMV by 2028, we expect GMV growth to consistently outpace revenue growth in B2C over the coming years. Additionally, significant growth in our high-margin retail media business across Zalando and ABOUT YOU contributed to the revenue growth in B2C. As a result, Retail Media revenues increased 1.7% of B2C GMV. In summary, our B2C business continues to expand based on our multi-app approach and increasing distribution, frequency and debt. The strong top line performance of the B2C segment was supported by generally stronger customer metrics. The increase in GMV was driven by the combination of more active customers and higher customer spending. First, we saw strong growth in active customers. This was primarily driven by the inclusion of ABOUT YOU, but was supplemented by solid growth within the stand-alone customer bases of both Zalando and ABOUT YOU. By the end of Q1, the number of active customers reached a new high of 62.3 million customers, an increase of close to 10 million customers year-on-year. As in previous quarters, close to 6 million customers currently use both Zalando and ABOUT YOU. Moving to the right. At the same time, we continue to increase our share of wallet as existing customers are spending more on our platform. Average spend per customer rose by 2.9% to [indiscernible]. This increase was driven by a larger average basket size, while the average number of orders by active customer remains stable. Overall, we continue to attract more customers to our consumer apps to increase our share fall. The top line growth contributed to an overall increase in gross profit of 22.5% to more than EUR 1.1 billion. This translated into a B2C gross margin of 41.5%, which is 0.6 percentage points lower than in Q1 2025. The development was driven by the consolidation of ABOUT YOU with lower gross margin and had a negative impact of 1.1 percentage points. In Zalando B2C, we were able to grow the gross margin by 0.5 percentage points, mainly thanks to a very healthy and well-executed inventory clearing process. Through the strategic use of Lounge and data-driven discounting, we were able to move all the stock at improved margins. This was a big win for the past 3 months. We told you last quarter that we had elevated inventory to clear. We delivered that clearance. And in spite of that effort reported a 0.5 percentage point increase in Zalando B2C gross margin. B2C adjusted EBIT for the quarter was EUR 38 million. This represents 0.5 percentage point margin drop from the previous year to 1.4%. This margin softening was mainly a result of dilution following the consolidation of ABOUT YOU. Zalando B2C telone adjusted EBIT margin remained broadly stable as the improved gross margin was offset by an increase in fulfillment costs, driven by the consolidation of our network and ramp-up of our new logistics side. Moving to B2B. In B2B, also, we continued to accelerate our financial performance. In the first quarter of 2026, we grew B2B revenues by nearly 24%. On a pro forma basis, the B2B business grew by 16.6% compared to the previous year, so well above group revenue growth. ZEOS fulfillment, which includes both the Zalando fulfillment solutions and multichannel fulfillment drove our B2B expansion. Set aside in strong double-digit growth by successfully keeping pace with the scaling of the partner business. Multichannel fulfillment experienced a very strong acceleration in growth, particularly due to the key collaborations with partners like British Retail and Next. The inclusion of SCAYLE led to an increase of software revenues. The strong B2B revenue growth translated into higher profits and significant margin expansion. Our gross profit margin expanded by 5.8 percentage points to 18.2%. With very strong growth in B2B gross margin, directly translated into adjusted EBIT increasing by more than 4x to EUR 26 million and the margin tripling to 8.6%. This improvement was driven by 3 factors. First, we realized efficiency gains and increased care within the fulfillment, as we bring on more and more large-scale merchants onto the platform. For example, we are now bringing on Marks & Spencer shortly without incremental investments in the platform. Second, the margin expanded, thanks to the inclusion of SCAYLE, which contributes higher margin software revenues. In Turkey, our margin paid this quarter from a favorable one-off provision release of EUR 4 million. Without this release, the B2B margin would have been 7.4%. Our strong growth in the B2B business has enabled us to achieve a solid overall increase in the group's adjusted EBIT. Overall, our adjusted EBIT margin improved from 1.9% to 2.2% in Q1 '26 versus Q1 '25. This is mostly driven by a stable gross margin and operating efficiencies in admin costs. Gross margin on a group level remained stable. Fulfillment costs increased by 0.6 percentage points due to the consolidation of ABOUT YOU and temporary transition costs from consolidating our network in ramping up our new logistics sites. While the majority of our long-term fulfillment savings will come from network optimization, we are complementing the structural move with AI-powered automation. Marketing costs slightly rose by 1 -- by 0.1 percentage points, driven by the consolidation of ABOUT YOU. Admin costs decreased by 0.8 percentage points, which reflects enhanced operational efficiency. Other operating expenses increased due towards EUR 97 million of restructuring charge for the reshaping of our logistics network we announced in January this year as well as other restructuring measures to further boost operating leverage. Those one-off costs are, as usual, reported outside of adjusted EBIT. In Q1 '26, EBIT total adjustments amounted to EUR 144.5 million. We anticipate the total adjustments for the 2026 financial year of approximately EUR 300 million, as communicated during our full year call with the remaining amount distributed relatively evenly over the next 3 quarters. Let me now turn to our balance sheet and cash flow development. We continue to operate with negative working capital. At the end of Q1, we had negative working capital of EUR 240 million compared to negative working capital of EUR 670 million at the end of '25. As we guided you on the full year earnings call in March, we settled in Q1, high-volume partner payouts from peak seasons trading, and our payables have returned to a more normalized level this quarter. But the major win this quarter was the development of our inventory. Zalando stand-alone inventory growth slowed from 12% in Q4 '25 to 2% in Q1 '26. This reflects our effective efforts to clear the extra inventory accumulated during Q4. We have aligned our buying plans in retail with a significant growth momentum of the partner business and expect inventory to trend in line with B2C revenue growth going forward. On a reported basis, in Q1, the inclusion of ABOUT YOU drove 22.5% increase in our total inventory. Our cash and cash equivalents remained solid and ended the quarter at around EUR 1.3 billion. This level aligns well with our capital allocation framework to hold a liquidity buffer of 10% of last 12 months revenue. This figure is about EUR 600 million lower than our cash flow position 3 months ago. As most of you know, Q1 typically sees the cash outflow, and this was slightly more elevated this year because it's payable to our partners who experienced a great business. In terms of CapEx, we continue to invest in our data and infrastructure engine. CapEx spend in Q1 mainly related to investments in the ramp-up of fulfillment centers in Germany, France and Sweden, decreasing spending on debt investments and the inclusion of Pati. Furthermore, our share buyback is progressing at pace, leading to a cash outflow of EUR 62 million. At the end of March, we still had around EUR 240 million remaining to complete the program. This concludes the financial update for Q1. Now, let's move to the outlook on Page 14. And for that, I will hand it back to Robert.

Thank you, Anna. So overall, our business performed strongly in Q1, and we are proud of our tons achievement. We had a strong start of the spring summer season and consumer demand persists despite a volatile geopolitical and substitute environment. and we have many times proven in the past, our resilience and our ability to navigate these situations. So we reiterate our guidance for the financial year 2026 that we provided in March. And our focus is, as always, executing our strategy, investing into the immense opportunities we have in delivering a strong financial performance in 2026. So this concludes our presentation for today. . And before we jump into Q&A, let me just wrap up with the key takeaways of today. We're happy with the team performance that we have delivered in Q1. We advanced our capabilities gaining traction in both our B2C and B2B segments. In B2C, we delivered strong growth across our team of consumer apps. In the B2B, we recorded continued strong double-digit growth. And we remain well on track to meet our full year targets. Thank you. And now, let's open up for the Q&A.

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from Monique Pollard from Citi.

The first question that I had was just on the performance costs. Just hoping you could help us to understand the time line of the ramp-up for the performance costs, so how long that would be expected to be a drag on Zalando kind of stand-alone EBIT margins for? And the second question I had was on the B2B gross margin. So obviously, a very strong progression in the B2B gross margin this quarter year-on-year. Anna, you've called out obviously the benefit from scale. But just also trying to understand where the B2B gross margin could go in a steady state, please?

Monique, thank you for your questions. Let me start with the question on the fulfillment cost development. As we have told you in the past, we are running a program of consolidating our logistics network and utilizing the capacity. For this, we are renting up more modern centers and ramping down centers, which we have announced that we will close. So this reshuffling is planned to be executed in H1. So this is what you can expect. And then, obviously, this is a very big lever for us to achieve our midterm guidance in 2028, as we will see the benefits from this consolidation starting in 2027 and then in 2028 coming to the full impact. So let me move to the second question on our B2B margin. And indeed, we are very pleased with the development of the B2B margin, and we have here 2 structural effects: one is the increasing scale and efficiency in our ZEOS business, where we saw an improvement in the margin. And secondly, as we grow our software business, they come with structurally better margin as well as supports the margin development. So the 18% -- 17%, 18%, which you have seen in Q1 is as well what we expect going forward.

The next question comes from Mia Strauss with BNP Paribas.

Just 2 for me. Maybe if you can maybe give a bit more color in terms of current trading and how you exited the quarter. I understand that you haven't really seen an impact from the Middle East, but just more broadly, I guess, how do you feel you're positioned now versus back in 2022, where we saw the higher inflation? . And then secondly, I just wanted to -- in the context of the gross margin, obviously, the Q1 was broadly stable. And I think you're still expecting Q2 some inventory clearance. How should we think about the gross margin for Q2 and then into the second half of the year?

Yes. Thank you, Mia. Let me start with the gross margin and then Robert and myself will ask -- we answer the current trading and the differences to 2022. Yes, indeed, gross margin in the first quarter was stable and you have seen the moving parts, the dilution of ABOUT YOU was fully offset by our B2B and B2C gross margin. And indeed, in B2C Zalando, we could improve the margin, which was on the higher end of our expectations, and this was driven by a very effective and very well-executed clearance of the stock. As I told you in the March earnings call, we are focusing on healthy inventory management and clearing of the inventory during the first half of the year. So you can expect Q2 to be slightly below the previous year. And then, in H2, we will improve the gross margin going forward. So I'm just reiterating what I said in the earnings call in March. And now, regarding current trading, indeed, consumer demand persists in today's environment. And as before, the European consumer continues to be price sensitive and to be cautious, but no more. So since the start of the Middle East conflict. And we measure and we have not seen any measurable impact. But that said, we continue to closely monitor the situation as the conflict evolves. And Robert, maybe your memory from 2022.

Yes. I mean, as Anna said, like the consumer demand persists in today's environment. And I guess the difference, I think, that we see towards 2022, I think in 2022, there was actually like a big -- there was actually like observable big difference in how consumers actually reacted to the situation. And became actually from 1 day to the other, like much more price-sensible cost, and we saw that very much like to ensure in our numbers. What we see now is actually like, as Anna said, just a continuation of the same price sensitivity and cautious behavior as we've seen like in the past. But yes, it persists, and there's kind of no today kind of measurable the impact that we actually see. .

The next question comes from Anne Critchlow with Berenberg.

I've got 2, please. The first is on inventory. So if we look at in sort of inventory to revenues way, it still looks quite high. So I wondered if you had a target figure in mind that one day that you'd like to get to for inventories to revenues. And then the second question is about Rest of Europe. I wondered if you could comment on profitability in rest of Europe compared to the DACH region. And also on countries such as Spain, so whether you have a sense of when you might reach profitability in those types of countries?

On inventory, so I'm very pleased with the progress which we made in inventory. As you recall, we closed the year with an inventory of 12% year-over-year. And now, we are down to 1.9%, which is much more healthy because it's much more aligned with the top line growth. And we have aligned our buying plans going forward with the growth of the partner business and respectively, with the development of the wholesale business. And you can expect that there will be in sync. We are looking at GMV here when we as well make our plans for inventory and not at revenue growth, as you have noticed as well that the revenue growth is impacted by the strategic shift to a higher proportion of the partner business and of the partner business outgrowing the retail business, and this is why the right KPI to look here at is the GMV growth, and we are very well on track. And in regards to your question on Rest of Europe, as you know, we don't break down, and we don't report countries and as well don't disclose the EBIT margin. But you can be assured that we are having plans for each country, and we are driving efficiencies in growth country by country, respecting as well the very specific demand situation, competitive situation and playing with our team of apps with ABOUT YOU and Zalando and Zalando Lounge.

The next question comes from Jurgen Kolb with Kepler Cheuvreux.

Two ones. First of all, coming back on the current trading. I was wondering if you could share maybe some thoughts on what you're seeing from your vendors in terms of prices? Obviously, spring is probably -- summer is obviously is done. But what are you seeing in terms of prices for fall/winter this year, but also going into spring 2027? That's the first one. And secondly, you talked about the AI capabilities and your strong performance there. With the new customers that you're gaining with your AI technology, maybe some thoughts on how they are trending. Is there a difference in terms of churn? Are they more loyal? Maybe what are you seeing there in their activities? Maybe just more details on -- from that angle.

Good morning, Jurgen, and thank you for the question. I'm taking the current trading question. So you're asking about the buying conditions and if we see input prices going up. As you rightly say, we already stocked up for some spring '26 and as well on Autumn/Winter, we have negotiated and have preordered part of it. As you know, we do preorders and then reorders. And the season -- the buying season for spring/summer '27 are still ahead of us. And obviously, as always, we have a very strong relationship with our partners, and we will find here a solution, which is benefiting as well for the partners as for us. Yes, we will see. It's still early, but be assured that we are preparing as well so that we can mitigate some potential inflationary impacts on the number. And the second question?

And the second question, I mean, on more color on customer behaviors, like customer acquisition, so there is like in the newer cohorts of customer acquisitions, there's actually no significant difference in any kind of behaviors or patterns than to the course that we've seen in the past. I think 1 interesting maybe observation to show is an Zalando app, I think 1 of the good, I think, traction that we see is actually that as we have driven like the AI-based feed that actually serves us like kind of like inspiring content that we as well see that is actually now brings, I think, a little bit more engagement into the app. So we see actually some good kind of traction in terms of like more visits actually in the Zalando app, which is what is driven by some of the AI-driven investments in content inspiration.

Our next question comes from Georgina Johanan with JPMorgan.

I have 2 questions, please. The first 1 was, I understand that the partner program and Lounge really outperformed and were up double digit, Presumably, that's on a pro forma basis. Just to understand, does that mean that the wholesale business is now actually going backwards? And is that ex Lounge, of course? And if that's the case, then does that have implications for your buying margin going forward? Just to understand that basically. . And then secondly, just coming back to the gross margin development, which I think was really impressive in the context of the elevated inventories. Are you saying that your drag on the gross margin year-on-year was actually lower from discounting, i.e., overall, you had lower discounting in Q1 than you did in Q1 '25. And just to understand, therefore, why we should expect the Q2 gross margin to be down. It just seems slightly counterintuitive.

So first, let me address the question on the partner business in the court of Lounge and wholesale in the Zalando app. And indeed, that the wholesale business in the Zalando app is flat. And as you know, we are optimizing for the group. We are optimizing for Zalando, and we're not optimizing wholesale or partner business, and this is completely in line with our strategy because we would like to expand our platform reach and to call the partner business. Obviously, next is with inventory. But as well, we can go the engagement with our partners, which is not only using our marketplace, but as well increasing the retail media spend as well using our logistic services. So exactly, on strategy. So now moving to the question, what could be the impact on our buying conditions? No, there is no impact. Two reasons for that. The wholesale business is still big, yes. So we are targeting 40%, 50% partner business, and we still have a big proportion, which is wholesale, which is great because then we have 2 legs to walk on. And as well, we have ABOUT YOU, yes, which will, again, increases the volume, and we have already gone through the cycle of negotiation, which we already shared with you and which is visible in synergy. So now to the question on the gross margins. There were 2 parts of the question. The first one is, what made it different here compared to last year? Was it discounting driven? And the second is, what could we expect in Q2? And you're saying that it feels counter into out. So we usually compare year-over-year the quarters rather than Q4 to Q1. As you know, Q4 is a quarter which is very promotional. We have a lot of campaigns, which have single day, we have cyber, we have Christmas. People are spending more, so -- and its discounting heavy. And as we told you in the last earnings call is that we optimize with our data-driven algorithms, discounting performance marketing and recently as well in our loyalty program so that we get the best gross margin given not only the demand side, but as well the stock -- so this is different in Q1. In Q1, we don't have that much promotional environment in Q4 and as well is the start of the season, where you see as well more black prices as we kick off. So now, moving to the second part of the second question, why I am expecting the Q2 margin to go down again? We have here the dilution of ABOUT YOU. As you know, it laps in July. And we still are focusing on the inventory clearance. So we would really to have here clean table. And as we are committing for the buying budget for spring/summer season '27 so that we have a good starting basis, and this is why my base assumption is that we will have a lower margin in Q2.

The next question comes from Yashraj Rajani with UBS.

I've got 2, please. The first 1 is just a follow-up on the current trading question. So obviously, I know you don't comment on months, but just given we have very different weather comps from last year, can you remind us that from May and June, do the comps actually get tougher? Or do they get easier? And just given we are halfway through Q2 already, can you confirm that based on your Middle East comments, can you confirm that there is no deterioration from the 5% to 6% GMV growth run rate that you're seeing so far? So that's the first question. And as far as the second question is concerned, it's on marketing costs. So very slight negative development year-on-year on an underlying basis. Can you tell us that -- is this a function of higher customer acquisition costs because of AI? And do you think that customer acquisition costs incrementally are getting tougher because of AI agents? Or do you think incrementally they should get better and it should be favorable in the second half?

Yashraj, thank you for your questions on current trading. So as I told you, we see consumer demand persisting in today's environment. So I can't speak for May and June because it still needs to happen, and we are closely monitoring. But what we see today, and without reflecting any potential driven impact of a prolonged crisis, we confirm our guidance. And in Q2, we expect pro forma GMV growth to remain in the mid-single-digit range. On the marketing cost question, so the increase in marketing costs is driven by the inclusion of ABOUT YOU. So indeed, in Zalando, we spent less in performance marketing. As you know, we are well preparing for a very exciting event starting in June with, so -- but underlying, we didn't spend more for new customers. We really doubled down on clearing the inventory. So no deterioration of the metrics there.

The next question comes from Richard Chamberlain with RBC.

Maybe I just ask a couple more on costs, if that's all right. Just looking at Page 10 of the presentation. You touched on marketing costs. Can you also just explain about the restructuring costs? I think it was close to EUR 100 million in the quarter. Are we done now on restructuring costs? So are you expecting more of those in Q2 and for the rest of the year? . And then the other 1 is on the acquisition-related expenses, I guess, relating to ABOUT YOU. Can you give a bit more color on that and also your expectation on that line for the balance of the year as well?

Richard, so let me start with the adjustments and the restructuring costs. So as I said, we are expecting EUR 300 million in total adjustments for the year, EUR 144 million we booked in Q1, of which the majority was tied to the restructuring of the logistics network and as well overhead restructuring, which we as well announced in June, for example, content studio. So we made big progress with AI. So this is how you see it as well in the overhead costs. We stick to the number. And the numbers consist, as I shared with you as well, so we have the share-based payments, which is a bit more than third. And then, we have the restructuring costs, and then, we have purchase price allocation, which is a customer relations and equity from -- which is noncash. And then, we have the integration cost. And I guided you as well that for the whole period, we have planned mid-digit million number for integration costs, and the biggest proportion will be due this year. Yes. So this is what you can expect. No new news. Yes, we just want to talk here.

Next question comes from Adam Cochrane with Deutsche Bank.

Two questions from me. The first question is, in terms of the how you treated inventory and markdown promotions differently in 1Q compared to 4Q, am I right in understanding that most of the difference in that is because of different market conditions, so 4Q being a more promotional market across the industry, you just have to participate? Or is there any change in the way that you did things in 1Q? And added to that, is there any element of the inventory that was written down or provided in Q4 so that you didn't have to do the same in 1Q, and then, when you sell it on Zalando Lounge, it's already been written down. So you don't have the same impact in -- than you did in the fourth quarter. . And in terms of the second question, it doesn't feel like you're balancing sort of revenue growth and gross margin a bit more carefully in the first quarter. How are you thinking about the pro forma revenue growth? So the plus 2.1% in B2C, looking into sort of Q2 and the second half, based on your outlook, I'm assuming you are expecting an acceleration of that as the year progresses, what exactly are you basing that on, an improvement in consumer confidence, customer behavior? Or is it more Zalando specific initiatives?

Thank you, Adam. Let me start with the inventory question and the consumer environment. So usually, as I said, Q4 is different than Q1 in terms of promotional activities because we have cyber and we have a lot of campaigns going on. And in Q1, you have the start of the spring and summer season. So this is what is different. This is the nature of the seasonality of our business. What we have done is we use more broadly Lounge in clearing the old stock. And indeed, as you say, if we have very old stock, it has written off. And obviously, when it is sold on Lounge, then you have a favorable impact. So exactly as you said. On revenue growth in Q1 this year, we had 2.1% revenue growth in consumer, which was mainly driven by the partner business outgrowing the Zalando retail business. Last year, it was exactly the other way around. So the wholesale business was growing faster than the partner business. So this is what you're seeing as the impact. And ABOUT YOU has a much stronger retail business growth, partner business is still a very small proportion. And going forward, we are sticking to our guidance, yes. And this is actually, indeed, why we're giving you a range, and the range is quite broad because we can see positives from the consumer environment, but we don't control it, yes. So what we double down is what we execute, how we execute, and Robert was talking a lot about that's how we leverage AI as well to make -- to increase the customer experience to make our proposition more attractive, but as well to reduce return rate, which as well has an impact of the top line. So what I'm saying is that we stick to our guidance, and we don't reflect here any potential adverse impact of a prolonged conflict in the Middle East.

And our last question for today's call comes from Andreas Riemann with ODDO.

A few questions, actually on SCAYLE. So what's the underlying growth of the SCAYLE business at present? And as of when do you expect the levels to be included in your numbers? And a bit broader, did you already renew contracts of SCAYLE customers? And did the commissions change when you renewed those contracts? So a bit more insight on SCAYLE would be appreciated.

Yes. Andreas, happy to talk you to SCAYLE. We're very happy to have SCAYLE in our portfolio because this complements, obviously, our logistic and software offers. So we will -- levels still not in the numbers. So we'll come later on as we are onboarding. So it will be in H2. Then, in terms of the take rates, no, the take rate is the same. So we haven't seen the reduction on the take rate. And as you know, we don't disclose revenue growth of scale, but underlying the revenue growth is around 9% for the quarter.

Ladies and gentlemen, that was the last question. I would now like to turn the conference back over to the management for any closing remarks.

Thanks, everyone, for joining today's earnings call session. If there are any further questions, don't hesitate to contact us, and handing over to Anna to wrap it up for today's.

Thank you, everyone, for joining. It is important that you take away that we are progressing very well in executing of our strategy and delivering on our financial performance, which have done so in 2025, and Q1 in 2026 is a further proof point that we deliver. And we are excited about the future and how we can leverage the power of AI, the power of our teams and the power of our tech platform and to create more value for our customers, for the partners and for the company. Thank you very much and speak to you soon.

Ladies and gentlemen, the conference is now over. Thank you for choosing Chorus Call, and thank you for participating in the conference. You may now disconnect your lines. Goodbye.