I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Greg Taylor, Founder and CEO. Please go ahead.
Good morning, everyone, and thanks for joining today's call. I'm Greg Taylor, CEO and Founder of Step One, and joining me today is our CFO, Nigel Underwood. This morning we announced our financial results for the first half of FY2025, and I'm pleased to take you through the highlights. Turning to slide two, please. In the context of a challenging retail environment, we're pleased to have delivered a resilient result. We prioritize profitable growth and efficient customer acquisition, and we're well placed to continue our profitable growth journey. Against a record comparative period, we delivered AUD 48.1 million revenue, up 6.8% on PCP. We deployed effective pricing and promotional strategies to create traction amongst our value-conscious customers in otherwise difficult conditions. Direct and efficient marketing is in our DNA, and pleasingly, lowered advertising costs as a percent of revenue to 29% compared to 34.1% last year.
Our women's and indirect revenue grew by 19.1% and 38%, respectively, in the period. On the back of this and our focus on efficiency, our EBITDA was up over 10% to AUD 11.2 million. We're in a strong financial position and pleased to declare an interim dividend of AUD 0.044 per share, fully franked. Turning to slide three, please. Growth strategy. Our profitable growth strategy is underpinned by four key pillars. Number one, product. Our mission is to transform the underwear market. We've done this by bringing innovative, ethical, comfortable, and sustainable functional products to market that solve a problem for our customers. Range and innovation are essential to attracting new and retaining customers, and it's a priority of ours. Two, pillar two, customer acquisition. We have a strong track record of efficient D2C customer acquisition and growing our database efficiently.
We're strategically supplementing that growth with targeted partnerships with organizations and athletes. Our D2C stats support our efforts in this department, with nearly 70% of our customers returning in the half. Pillar three, indirect channels. We're supporting our D2C growth by building a presence in trusted and established retail and e-commerce channels. This allows us to expand our reach, brand, and tap into new databases of customers. Finally, our footprint. Our plan is to emulate our profitable growth in Australia and scale diligently in global markets where there is demand. We are leveraging our successes and learnings from our proven Australian model. In the short term, we focus on winning Australian market share across our categories in Australia. Abroad, we're looking to grow profitably in the U.K., and the U.S. is now a longer-term priority, allowing us to refine our approach before further investments. Turning to slide four, our strategy.
This half, we continue to execute against our strategy. We expanded our women's line with the launch of our Smooth Fit range in August with a boy short and bralette. Expanding our women's range is highly strategic. Our women's line offers significant upside for all SKUs because of the value of our female customers and the value they bring. These customers are proven to often buy men's products as well, and a major part of our focus is to ensure growth continues and to compound. During the period, we signed several more athlete ambassadors who generate authentic Step One content and help attract new customers and eyeballs in a really core demographic for us. We also partnered with September and continued our amazing relationship with Surf Life Saving Australia.
On channels, we progressed to the contractual and technical integration works to sell on new channels, including TikTok Shop and Amazon. During the half, revenue from Amazon grew nearly 30% to AUD 3.5 million, now accounting for over 7% of total revenue. In addition to contributing to revenue growth, Amazon enhances Step One's credibility and market reach in the U.K. We saw solid profitable growth in this half in Australia and modest profitable growth in the U.K. We made an important step during the period and put boots on the ground in the U.K. to support broadening our brand awareness. Whilst working closely with myself and the Australian team, our U.K. operations will leverage learnings and skills from our successful home market. Having on-the-ground marketing expertise to adapt strategies locally is an important step in scaling diligently.
We've seen great results in Australia and look forward to driving this success across geographies. Slide five, new products. I also want to talk about a new product which we spoke about earlier this year, our Cloud Mesh. This new and innovative material is designed to efficiently transfer heat. This product is engineered for airflow, keeping our customer cool no matter the circumstances. Product innovation continues to drive and is at the core of our existing customer value and driving consumer traffic. Slide six, operations by region. In Australia, revenue grew over 17%, reflective of strong brand awareness continuing to drive momentum. We saw benefits from collaborations with brands, ambassadors, and advocacy, which delivered customer growth. In the U.K., cost of living pressures impacted consumer spend. However, despite this, we still delivered a modest 7% revenue growth.
During the period, we saw organic sales traction in Europe through our direct U.K. website and U.K. Amazon. As I mentioned earlier, we've begun the process of systemizing our profitable growth strategy to emulate our Australian growth trajectory. We have hired dedicated resources in the U.K. and will continue to prioritize patient and profitable growth. I'm happy to report last week we launched in store with one of the U.K.'s most beloved and established retailers, John Lewis. Per our strategy, we see this as another avenue to broaden our brand awareness. In terms of the U.S., given the prevailing market conditions, we prioritize profit and pull back on investment. This is part of the benefit of having an agile and adaptable business model. We'll continue to invest in our capital-light partnerships, including Amazon and other social commerce channels, to remain present in the market.
However, we have minimized our direct advertising. We now view the U.S. as a longer-term opportunity, and we tend to intend to scale diligently in the U.K. first and then take this strategy to the U.S. Turning to slide seven, we delivered a 4.5% conversion rate in line with the second half of last year. This is a very strong result by industry standards. In addition, we grew our customer base to over 1.8 million and had a 69% return customer rate for the third period in a row. We lowered our advertising as a percentage of revenue, which is now under 30%, to 29%. This reflects our agility and direct marketing expertise and our success in building and retaining a loyal customer base. I'll hand over to Nigel to talk through some of our financials in more detail. Over to you, Nigel.
Thanks, Greg. Turning to slide eight. In the context of challenging market conditions, we're pleased to have delivered a resilient revenue growth of 17.4% in our core Australian market. This highlights the strength of our product and offering in our home market. While our global revenue increased 6.8%, it reflects a mixture of trading conditions and our strategic focus on profitability when growth is not economically available. Pleasingly, and in line with our strategy, revenue from women's and indirect channels grew by 19% and 38%, respectively. Gross margin declined to 78%, driven by a pivot towards attracting value-conscious customers during sale periods. Advertising costs reduced to 29% of revenue, offsetting margin pressure and reinforcing the efficiency of the business model. We are constantly monitoring trading conditions and will make adjustments to the marketing mix in each country as required.
Our ability to be agile and maintain profitability is a key feature of our business model. Overall, our EBITDA increased 10.4% on PCP, while net profit after tax increased 15.1%. Turning to slide nine, the balance sheet. Step One remains debt-free, with cash and financial assets diversified across licensed banks with a variety of terms. Inventory increased AUD 3.7 million in the half as we expanded the product range. Turnover remained stable at approximately 1.2 years, aligning with our inventory strategy. While inventory is neither perishable nor seasonal, a 5% provision is maintained for older SKUs. Turning to slide ten, the cash flow. We have a strong cash flow generation profile, with cash receipts increasing in line with revenue growth. Dividends totaling AUD 5.2 million were paid in the period, which was 100% of the previous period's earnings, being the second half of FY2024.
We plan to pay 100% of earnings out again this period, with an AUD 8 million dividend payable in March 2025. Term deposits with durations exceeding three months are classified as investments. After adjusting for this classification requirement, cash flow was a positive AUD 4.6 million. The group maintains a strong financial position, with cash and term deposits totaling AUD 43 million, all held with licensed banks. The cash flow supports the conclusion that the business remains capital-light. I'll hand you back to Greg.
Thanks, Nigel. Slide 11, strategy and plan of action. We have a clear plan of action for the second half of FY2025 to keep growing profitably. We have exciting product developments, including sending our Junior's range, new sports products, socks, and other areas. In terms of channels, last week we launched in store with John Lewis, as mentioned. We expect to build this to build our brand awareness and legitimacy in the U.K. We'll also be launching our products through additional channels. Regarding our footprint, we'll continue to prioritize Australian expansion while pursuing profitable growth in the U.K., utilizing our local resources. We will maintain the capital-light optionality in the U.S. and other markets. Turning to slide 12, our outlook. We're confident in our strategy and our ability to execute on it. Our focus remains steady.
We're going to expand our product range, requiring new customers through efficient acquisition and partnership expansion. As we've shown, we will deliver profitable growth while exploring new channels where momentum is building. No guidance is being provided for FY2025. To close, the resilience demonstrated in delivering this first-half performance against a record comparative period and challenging retail conditions reinforces the strength of Step One's core product ability, Step One's core product and unique features, our ability to market efficiently, our success in building and retaining a loyal customer base, and the value of our profitable growth strategy. While the environment remains challenging, we're committed to future-proofing the business and driving growth through new products, new channels, and strategic partnerships. I'll now open the line for any questions. Thank you for your time.
Thank you. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. If you would like to cancel your request, please press star two. If you are on a speakerphone, please pick up the handset to ask your question. Your first question today comes from Alexander Ma from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Good morning, Greg and Nigel. Just firstly, with regard to the U.S., can I just be clear on what the strategy now is? Am I to understand that we're going to be continuing with partnerships with Amazon and other affiliates, but we're not going to be looking to actively grow that business through our own direct marketing?
Yeah. Thanks for the question, Alex. Yeah, look, as we've mentioned, we're always looking for profitable growth. In areas where we've talked about we can grow profitably, we will. Where it's challenging, we won't. We've seen, obviously, some growth in the previous year in the U.K. We'll pursue that. Where there is opportunity to grow profitably, we will. As we said, maintaining a capital-light structure for the U.S. is something that we will continue to do, reduce costs there, but there'll also be that opportunity there for us to grow when the right opportunity presents itself to us.
Thank you. I think that's certainly the right strategy. Does that mean that the 29% ratio of marketing cost to sales is a number that we should think about as sustainable going into the future?
Yeah, Alex, we're not providing further guidance. That's probably the current position is the best one, but we will constantly work towards improving our marketing spend and margin position as we go forward. The current half is your best guidance for following forecasts.
I'll just reiterate, Alex, my point, that we have been very disciplined in our marketing costs through this period. We've got the mix right for both profit and growth in this half. We will continue to look at, obviously, take a close look at what that percentage of revenue is. It does show our ability to pull levers quickly and get the best efficiency out of our marketing dollars when we do spend them.
That's great. Thank you. Just with regard to, obviously, a really stellar performance in Australia, so congratulations on that. The promotional strategy that you've adopted has clearly been instrumental. It does mean, of course, that the gross margins are down, albeit AOV is up. Is this something that we should see as a guide for the future, this gross margin in the high 70s rather than the low 80s?
Once again, this current half is probably the best indicator for going forward. We will obviously work towards improving and increasing that margin, but we do not want to preempt where we are going to be. The current level is probably the better go forward position.
Awesome. Thanks. Finally, with regard to John Lewis, congratulations for launching in store. I'm just wondering if you can give us a bit more color about how many stores you'll be in and how many SKUs we should be thinking about. I suppose I'm just trying to get a sense for what this could do to U.K. growth in the second half.
Yeah. Thanks for the good question you asked. Obviously, Alex, being from the U.K., you'd understand, I guess, the enormity of what it means to actually be in John Lewis. It's such a beloved and revered store over there. We had a really great launch on Thursday in store there. I think we're in about 15 of their stores at the moment. There are approximately 40 across the country. It will be a rollout dependent on sales and how we progress. All signs are positive. We had a very successful launch on Thursday. We've been working really closely with the John Lewis team. They've now got a new product offering to their customers, which has been really core around their mandate, particularly around FSC-certified brands or FSC-certified brands being as part of their product mix. We'll continue to push that.
I think also looking at our brand equity and brand awareness, that will certainly assist with our brand awareness and credibility in the U.K., as I mentioned. Because as for those who are familiar with it, John Lewis is really one of the brands that you do want to be a part of. Having the scale that they do across the U.K. will give our brand a really high exposure across their stores once we do roll them out.
Excellent. Thank you. Certainly, in my opinion, this result does show that your focus on profitable growth is really meaningful. The fact that you've beaten estimates for EBITDA is testament to that. Well done. Congratulations, and good luck for the second half.
Thanks, Alex.
Thank you. Once again, if you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wave your name to be announced. Your next question comes from Michael Wu, a private investor. Please go ahead.
Thanks for taking my question. During the Black Friday period, I noticed that the company had some fulfillment issues at the Australian warehouse. I got this impression from the negative Trustpilot reviews as well as my own order experience. Would you be able to elaborate on what happened and whether it had a negative impact on the Australian results?
Thanks for your question, Michael. Look, during the Black Friday period, the entire postal and logistics systems were well choked up, and we're subject to those. The delays, we are aware of a number of those delays, but they were actually less than in prior years. Every year, we work on improving that process. The ask is to try and make sure that we remedy it when we're advised that there is a delay or someone hasn't received their order, and we fix it accordingly. Look, we want to learn from every sale we do. We want to learn, but there are issues with the entire, literally, the global logistics systems during those busy sale periods.
Thanks for that. One last question. I think at the full year, it was mentioned that you were looking at expanding into Canada and Germany. Would we be able to get an update on that?
Yeah. Look, their markets were clearly the people like our Step One product. We're trying to find the best way into those, the best way to expand in those markets. We have to go through a small period where we gain the appropriate registrations to sell direct rather than cross-border transactions. We're reworking some of those entries. One day, I hope that I can report that there are a relevant percentage of our sales, but at this point, they're exploratory and small.
Okay. Thanks a lot for that. Thank you. As there are no further questions at this time, I'll now hand back to Mr. Taylor for any closing remarks.
Thank you, everyone, for joining the call. As you can see, we've been very disciplined in our marketing costs during the period. We've shown we do pull growth levers when the conditions are right. We do reinvest in our growth. We've got a good cash balance and it gives us the potential to invest in areas where we do see opportunity. We do believe we found a right mix of profit and growth during this challenging period for the half and look forward to growing the business further. Thank you, everyone, for your time, and look forward to speaking to you again in six months or so. Thank you.
That does conclude our conference for today. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.