Good morning. I'm Gloria Martin, Logista's Director of Investor Relations. Welcome to this audio webcast to discuss the results of the 2020 fiscal year, about which you will find more details on our website. I'm joined today by Íñigo Meirás, Logista's CEO, and by Manuel Suárez, our CFO, who will lead this audio webcast together. After the presentation, there will be a Q&A session in which we shall read and answer every question received in the webcast forum between the publication of these results and the end of the webcast. The document that accompanies this presentation and the observations which will be made as it progresses include forward-looking statements and projections concerning future results. I invite you to read, at the beginning of the document, the disclaimer which mentions the various factors that could cause the actual results to differ from the projections or forward-looking statements.
I'm now handing over to Íñigo Meirás. Íñigo.
Thank you, Gloria, and welcome everyone. During this audio webcast, we are going to deal with the highlights of the results, a review of the businesses, and a financial review, and we shall end with an outlook for the forthcoming year. The results of the 2020 fiscal year, my first as the company's CEO, were solid in spite of the challenging environment in which the activities took place, which was so much affected by the COVID-19 coronavirus. Economic sales increased by 0.7% and EBIT by 1%, whereas the adjusted EBIT decreased by 1.9% and net profit by 4.5%.
Since the pandemic began, our management has focused on handling the impacts caused by the adverse environment that we faced due to COVID-19, basically in four directions: ensuring the distribution to our customers, responding to the new needs that have arisen in this scenario with new services, protecting our people, and managing our costs. This pandemic has brought about a substantial change in the way of life to which we were accustomed and has profoundly affected the way in which economic activities are conducted worldwide, including, of course, in the countries where we operate. In this scenario, the principal channels and product sectors in which Logista provides its services were considered essential, so we had to assure distribution at all times in spite of the difficult situation.
Although the adverse circumstances which surrounded the company's operation for most of the fiscal year certainly constitute a challenge, they also represented an opportunity which we were able to take advantage of thanks to the strength of our unique business model. Our lengthy efforts to achieve flexibility and automation in our operations and in the development of a multi-channel offer of alternative ordering options have enabled us to ensure continuity in our activity throughout all of those months. Our commitment as a distributor specializing in neighborhood channels was also a crucial factor in the furtherance of our business. The points of sale with which we served experienced an increase in consumers' demands for other products, different from their usual products, and Logista was one of the few companies that was able to guarantee to distribute them quickly and simply.
Moreover, our traditional investments in quality helped to reinforce our status as the leading partner in certain sectors, for example, where reliable distribution services are required for our e-commerce sales, an area in which we are now growing significantly. In addition, the business intelligence services which we had been offering to all our manufacturing customers have been the appropriate response to the need for information about their products.
As we can see, the changes brought about by the pandemic have generated new needs among our customers, and at Logista, we have been helping them to satisfy those needs by developing new services or by adapting some of those that we were already providing. For example, for the tobacco sector, we have increased the safety stocks in local warehouses so that the supply of these products, which are regarded as essential, will be assured in the event of a territorial confinement within each country.
In the case of high-volume consumer goods, we have offered the points of sale an extensive catalog of reference so that they can be able to their end users during confinements at home. The pharmaceutical sector and the hospital channel have also seen drastic alterations in certain critical aspects of their activities, so Logista Pharma, together with the hospital pharmaceutical services, devises in record time a solution involving a delivery direct to the patient's homes. This service allowed the sector to continue with the clinical trials that were in progress, which involved substantial investments. It also allowed patients suffering from chronic disease to continue with their treatments without being obliged to expose themselves to the potential sources of infection. The big increase in sales of e-commerce resulted in the manufacturers needed to rely on an operator that will guarantee a flexible, controlled, and high-quality delivery service.
Nacex adapted its procedures to ensure that deliveries remain contactless and also bolstered the expansion of its network of drop-in points and lockers. This kind of remote selling also aided the recovery of the book sector, which Logista also supported by means of the home delivery of purchases for our innovative printing on-demand service. But with that, preventing the expansion of the disease and assuring the safety and security of everyone around us at all times, this had been among the priorities in our management this year. We have used all the means at our disposal to maintain our activity safely for our employees, numbering almost 6,000 partners , and for our 9,000 partners, and in general for the communities in which we are a part.
Again, the big investments in IT resources and technology which Logista undertakes every year have facilitated the implementation of a smart working policy since the moment when the authorities first recommended teleworking. This smart working policy is still in operation in the Group today. Depending on their type of work, it can allow the employees flexibility in their timetables. This new reality which we are all facing has also affected the company's cost structure. Digitalization, which started from a solid base, has without doubt facilitated many of the adaptations that had been necessary in recent months to assure the correct performance of administrative tasks, although in some cases it has involved a tremendous increase in cost.