Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the publication of the Q1 Results 2026 conference call. I am George, the Chorus Call operator. I would like to remind you that all participants will be in listen-only mode , and the conference is being recorded. The presentation will be followed by a Q&A session . You can register for questions at any time by pressing star 1 on your telephone. For operator assistance, please press star 0. The conference must not be recorded for publication or broadcast. At this time, it's my pleasure to hand over to Patrick Kofler, Director of Investor Relations. Please go ahead, sir.
Good morning, 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 us 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 afterward . 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 the replay will be available on our investor relations webpage 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. We've made substantial progress again in the first few 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. 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, we relentlessly work on our strategy execution to achieve a larger coverage of it. Our Q1 performance was strong. It confirmed that we're well on track with our full-year targets, it's yet another step towards our mission goals.
There are five key highlights that demonstrate our overall progress in Q1, which I will show you now on the next page. Number 1, we've delivered a strong financial performance in Q1. At group level, we delivered strong double-digit growth. Reported GMV grew nearly 22%, group revenue is up nearly 24% compared to Q1 last year. We increased adjusted EBIT by 39% year-on-year to EUR 65 million. That brings our adjusted EBIT margin to 2.2%. Number 2, as well in Q1, we have advanced our AI capabilities, bringing further traction to both our B2C and B2B business. We continue to be impressed by what benefits AI can bring to both efficiency and growth of our business. I 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. About You and Lounge achieved even double-digit growth rates of GMV. In our core app, Zalando, our loyalty program, Zalando Plus, is a central engine to drive growth. We now have more than 18.5 million members. We recently launched new exciting benefits by adding food delivery subscription, Wolt+ as a partner benefit for our members. Number four, in B2B, we recorded continued strong double-digit growth. We've launched ZEOS with the first set of S-Partners in Norway, and we added 2 new sales channels. This expansion means we now serve a total of 26 markets and 20 sales channels via ZEOS. Number five, 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 targets, guys. Overall, I'm very happy with the performance of our team in the quarter. I will first talk about the progress on the AI developments before Anna dives into the financial performance. 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 better every day and 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.
The result of this expanding scale is an accumulation of more high-quality data, which in turn continuously refines and improves our solutions. 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. Yet in recent years and months, AI capabilities have scaled, 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. Firstly, we're making great progress to evolve our AI-based assistant from a chat tool into a true lifestyle companion at the forefront of agentic commerce. A key recent milestone last quarter was the upgrade to provide advice beyond fashion. We now cover sports and very recently as well beauty advice. Ask the assistant for highly specific advice.
For example, for hydrating Korean skincare or running shoes for overpronation, the assistants can now point you into very helpful directions. Numbers-wise, an impressive 10 million customers last quarter have interacted with our AI assistants, this is up from 6 million in the whole of 2025. 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. Already today, 2 million items a month are being autonomously handled by our growing fleet of warehouse robots. Now, based on the early successes through optimization and model training, we are rolling this impressive technology out across our network. This will improve throughput, scalability, and efficiency of our entire fulfillment operations across Europe. 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 and corrects image backgrounds of articles. We also correct about 6,000 article pictures daily and enrich 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. Another great win-win through AI. Those are just 3 examples which demonstrate our continuous traction of applying AI in our business, and I'm very much looking forward to sharing 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. 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 You. 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 as 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 standalone 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 three consumer apps on a reported basis and on a pro forma basis. Just like in 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, kids and family, and beauty. Pro forma revenue saw a moderate 2.1% 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 at Zalando standalone 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%-50% of total GMV by 2028, we expect GMV growth to consistently outpace revenue growth in B2C over the coming years. Significant growth in our high margin retail media business across Zalando and About You contributed to the revenue growth in B2C. Retail media revenues increased to 1.7% of B2C GMV. Our B2C business continues to expand based on our multi-app approach and increasing distribution frequency and depth. 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. 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 standalone 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 EUR 305. This increase was driven by a larger average basket size, while the average number of orders per active customer remained stable.
Overall, we continue to attract more customers to our consumer apps and increase our share of wallet. 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 older 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 0.5 percentage points increase in Zalando B2C gross margin. B2C adjusted EBIT for the year, 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 standalone 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 sites. Moving to B2B. In B2B also, we continued to accelerate our financial performance.
In the first quarter of 2026, we grew B2C revenues by nearly 24%. On a pro forma basis, the B2B business grew by 16.6% compared to the previous year, well above group revenue growth. ZEOS Fulfillment, which includes both Zalando Fulfilment Solutions and Multi-Channel Fulfillment, drove our B2B expansion. ZFS maintained in strong double-digit growth by successfully keeping pace with the scaling of the partner business. Multi-Channel Fulfillment experienced a very strong acceleration in growth, particularly due to the key collaborations with partners like British retailer Next. The inclusion of Scayle led to an increase of software revenues. This 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%.
This very strong growth in B2B gross margins directly translated into adjusted EBIT increasing by more than four times to EUR 26 million, and the margins tripling to 8.6%. This improvement was driven by 3 factors. First, we realized efficiency gains and increased scale within ZEOS 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. Thirdly, our margin benefited 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 2026 versus Q1 2025. This is mostly driven by a stable gross margin and operating efficiencies in admin costs. Gross margin on a group level remains stable. Fulfillment costs increased by 0.6 percentage points due to the consolidation of About You and temporary transition costs from consolidating our network and ramping up our new logistics sites. While the majority of our long-term fulfillment savings will come from network optimization, we are complementing this structural move with AI-powered automation. Marketing costs slightly rose 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 to a EUR 97 million 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 2026, 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 three 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 2025. As we guided you on the full year earnings call in March, we settled in Q1 high volume partner payouts on peak seasons trading, and our payables have returned to a more normalized level this quarter. The major win this quarter was the development of our inventory. Zalando's standalone inventory growth slowed from 12% in Q4 2025 to 2% in Q1 2026. This reflects our effective effort to clear the extra inventory accumulated during Q4. We have aligned our buying plans in retail with the 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 three months ago. As most of you know, Q1 typically sees a cash outflow, and this was slightly more elevated this year because of payables to our partners, who experienced a great Cyber Week business. In terms of CapEx, we continue to invest in our data and infrastructure engine.
CapEx spent in Q1 mainly relates to investments in the ramp-up of fulfillment centers in Germany, France, and Sweden, decreasing spending on tech investments and the inclusion of About You. 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. Overall, our business performed strongly in Q1, and we're proud of our team's achievements. We had a strong start of the spring-summer season, and consumer demand persists despite a volatile geopolitical and substitute environment. We have many times proven in the past our resilience and our ability to navigate these situations. We reiterate our guidance for financial year 2026 as we provided in March. Our focus is, as always, executing our strategy, investing into the immense opportunities ahead, and delivering a strong financial performance in 2026. This concludes our presentation for today. 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 AI capabilities, gaining traction in both our B2C and B2B segments.
In B2C, we delivered strong growth across our team of consumer apps. In B2B, we recorded continued strong double-digit growth. We remain well on track to meet our full year targets. Thank you. Now let's open up for the Q&A.
We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their telephone. You will hear a tone to confirm that you have entered the queue. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to use only handsets while asking a question. In the interest of time, please limit yourself to two questions.
Our first question comes from Monique Pollard and Citi. Please go ahead.
Morning. Thank you for taking my questions. The first question that I had was just on the fulfillment costs. Just hoping you could help us to understand the timeline of the ramp up for the fulfillment costs. How long it be expected to be a drag on Zalando kind of standalone EBIT margins for? The second question I had was on the B2B gross margin. 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. Just also trying to understand where the B2B gross margin could go in a steady state, please.
Good morning, 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're running a program of consolidating our logistic network and utilizing the capacity. For this, we are ramping up more modern centers and ramping down centers which we have announced that we will close. This reshuffling is planned to be executed in H1. This is what you can expect. 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.
Let me move to the second question on our B2B margin. Indeed, we are very pleased with the development of the B2B margin, and we have here two structural effects. One is the increasing scale and efficiency in our ZEOS business, where we saw an improvement in the margin. Secondly, as we grow our software business, they come with structurally a better margin, which as well supports the margin development. The 18%, 17%, 18% which you have seen in Q1 is as well what we expect going forward.
Right. Thank you.
The next question comes from Mia Strauss with BNP Paribas. Please go ahead.
Hi, good morning. Just 2 for me. Maybe if you could 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, you know, 2022, where we saw the higher inflation? Secondly, I just wanted to, in the context of the gross margin, obviously the Q1 was broadly stable. I think you're still expecting, you know, Q2 some inventory clearance. How should we think about the gross margin for Q2 and then into the second half of the year?
Thank you, Mia. Let me start with the gross margin and then Robert and myself will 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. 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.
You can expect Q2 to be slightly below the previous year. Then in H2, we will improve the gross margin going forward. I'm just reiterating what I said in the earnings call in March. Now, regarding current trading, indeed, consumer demand persists in today's environment. 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 conflicts. We, you know, we measure, and we have not seen any measurable impact. That said, we continue to closely monitor the situation as the conflict evolves. Robert, maybe, your memory from 2022?
Yeah. I mean, you know, as Anna said, like, you know, the consumer demand persists in today's environment. I guess the difference I think that we see towards 2022, I think in 2022, there was actually like an observable big difference in how consumers actually reacted towards the situation and became actually from one day to another, like much more price sensitive and cautious. We saw that very much, like 2022 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, you know, in the past. Yeah, it's, it persists. There's kind of no today kind of measurable big impact that we actually see.
The next question comes from Anne Critchlow with Berenberg. Please go ahead.
Thanks for taking my question. I've got two, please. The first is on inventory. If we look at it in a sort of inventory to revenues way, it still looks quite high. I wondered if you had a target figure in mind that one day you'd like to get to for inventories to revenues. 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. Whether you have a sense of, you know, when you might reach profitability in those types of countries. Thank you.
Good morning, Anne, thank you for the questions. On inventory, 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, now we are down to 1.9%, which is much more healthy because it's much more aligned with top line growth. We have aligned our buying plans going forward with the goals of the partner business and respectively with the development of the wholesale business. You can expect that they will be in sync. We are looking at a 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. This is why the right KPI to look here at is the GMV growth, and we are very well on track. 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 their EBIT margin.
You can be assured that, we are having plans for each country, and we are driving efficiencies in growth country, but by country, respecting as well the very specific demand situation, competitive situation, and playing with our team of apps with About You, Zalando, and Zalando Lounge.
The next question comes from Jürgen Kolb with Kepler Cheuvreux. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much indeed. 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 you're seeing, in terms of prices for fall/winter this year but also then going into spring, 2027. That's the first one. 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. Thank you very much.
Good morning, Jürgen, thank you for the question. You're asking about the buying conditions and if we see input prices going up. As you rightly say, we already are stocked up for summer, spring 2026, and as well autumn/winter. We have negotiated and have pre-ordered part of it. As you know, we do pre-orders and then re-orders. The season, the buying season for spring/summer 2027 is still ahead of us. Obviously, as always is, we have very strong relationship with our partners, and we will find here a solution which is benefiting as well for the partners as for us. Yeah, 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 Zalando. The second question?
Yeah, the second question, more color on customer behaviors, or customer acquisition. There is in the newer cohorts of customer acquisitions, there is actually no significant difference in any kind of behaviors or patterns than to the cohorts that we've seen in the past. I think one interesting maybe observation to share, Jürgen, is in the Zalando app, I think one of the good, I think, traction that we see is actually that as we have driven the AI-based feed, that actually surfaces kind of inspiring content that we actually as well see that is actually now.
Yeah, brings I think a little bit more engagement into the app. We see actually some good kind of tractions in terms of like more visits actually in the Zalando app, which is as well driven by some of the AI-driven investments in content inspiration.
Our next question comes from Georgina Johanan with JPMorgan. Please go ahead.
Hi. I have 2 questions, please. The first one was, I understand that the partner program and Lounge, you know, 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? If that's ex-Lounge, of course. If that's the case, does that have implications for your buying margin going forward? Yeah, just to understand that better, please. Secondly, just coming back to the gross margin development, which I think was really impressive in the context of the elevated inventory. Are you saying that your drag on the gross margin year-over-year was actually lower from discounting, i.e. overall you had lower discounting in Q1 than you did in Q1 2025?
Just to understand therefore why we should expect the Q2 gross margin to be down, it just seems slightly counterintuitive. Thank you.
Good morning, George, thank you for your question, questions. First let me address the question on the partner business and the growth of Lounge and wholesale in the Zalando app. Indeed, that the wholesale business in the Zalando app is flat. As you know, we are optimizing for the group. We are optimizing for Zalando, we're not optimizing wholesale or partner business. This is completely in line with our strategy because we would like to expand our platform reach and to grow the partner business.
Obviously, it has less risks with inventory, but as well, we can grow the engagement with our partners, which is not only using our marketplace, but as well, increasing the retail media spend and as well, using our logistic services. Exactly on strategy. 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. We are targeting 40%, 50% partner business, and we still have a big proportion, which is wholesale, which is great because then we have two legs to walk on. And as well, we have About You, which as well again increases the volume.
We have already gone through the cycle of negotiations, which we already shared with you and which is visible in synergies. Now to the question on the gross margins. There were two parts of the question. The first one is what made it different compared to last year. Was it discounting driven? The second is what could we expect in Q2, and you're saying that it feels counterintuitive. 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. We have Singles' Day, we have Cyber, we have Christmas. People are spending more, so and it's discounting heavy.
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 our loyalty program so that we get the best gross margin given not only the demand side, but as well the stock. This is different in Q1. In Q1, we don't have that much promotional environment as in Q4. As well, it's the start of the season, where you see as well more black prices as we kick off. 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 lapsed in July. We still are focusing on the inventory clearance, so we would really to have here a clean table. As we are committing for the buying budget for spring, summer season 2027, 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. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thank you for taking my questions. I've got 2, please. The first one is just a
Follow up on the current trading question. You know, 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, you know, from May and June, do the comps actually get tougher, or do they get easier? Just given we are halfway through Q2 already, can you confirm that, you know, based on your mid-single-digit comments, can you confirm that there is no deterioration from the 5% to 6% GMV growth run rate that you're seeing so far? That's the first question. As far as the second question is concerned, it's on marketing costs, a 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? Do you think that customer acquisition costs incrementally are getting tougher because of AI agents? Do you think incrementally they should get better and it should be favorable in the second half? Thank you.
Thank you, Yashraj, for your questions on current trading. As I told you, we see consumer demand persisting in today's environment. I can't speak for May and June because it still needs to happen, and we are closely monitoring. What we see today and without reflecting any potential adverse impact of a prolonged crisis, we confirm our guidance. In Q2, we expect pro forma GMV growth to remain in the mid-single-digit range. On the marketing cost question, the increase in marketing costs is driven by the inclusion of About You. Indeed, in Zalando, we spend less in performance marketing. As you know, we are as well preparing for a very exciting event starting in June with football.
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 Capital Markets. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thank you. Good morning. Maybe I want to 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, or are you expecting more of those in Q2 and for the rest of the year? Then the other one 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? Thank you.
Thank you, Richard. Let me start with the adjustments and the restructuring costs. As I said, we are expecting EUR 300 million in total adjustments for the year. EUR 144 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, a content studio. We made big progress with AI. This is how you see it as well in the end in the overhead cost. We stick to the number. The numbers consist as I shared with you as well. We have share-based payment, which is a bit more than a third.
We have the restructuring costs. We have purchase price allocation, which is a customer relations brand equity from which is non-cash. We have the integration cost. I guided you as well that for the whole period we have planned a mid-digit million number for integration cost, and the biggest proportion will be due this year. This is what you can expect. No new news. We just want to talk here.
The next question comes from Adam Cochrane with Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead.
Good morning. 2 questions from me. On the first question is, in terms of the how you treated inventory and markdown, excuse me, and promotions differently in 1 Q compared to 4 Q. Am I right in understanding that most of the difference in that is because of different market conditions, so 4 Q being a more promotional market across the industry, you just have to participate? Or is there any change in the way that you that you did things in 1 Q?
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 1 Q, and then when you sell it on Zalando Lounge, it's already been written down, so you don't have the same impact than you did in fourth quarter? In terms of the second question, it does appear 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? The plus 2.1% in B2C, looking into Q2 and the second half based on your outlook. I'm assuming that 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? Thanks.
Thank you, Adam. Let me start with the inventory question and the consumer environment. Usually, as I said, Q4 is different than Q1 in terms of promotional activity because we have Cyber and we have a lot of campaigns going on. In Q1, you have the start of the spring and summer season. 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. Indeed, as you say, if we have very old stock, it has written off. Obviously, when it is sold on Lounge, then you have a favorable impact. 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. The wholesale business was growing faster than the partner business. This is what you're seeing as the impact. About You has a much stronger retail business growth. Partner business is still very small proportion. Going forward, we are sticking to our guidance. Yeah. 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. Yeah.
What we double down is what we execute, how we execute. Robert was talking a lot about that, 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 rates, which as well has an impact of the top line. 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.
Our last question for today's call comes from Andreas Riemann with ODDO BHF. Please go ahead.
Good morning. A few questions actually around Scayle. What's the underlying growth of the Scayle business at present? As of when do you expect levels to be included in your numbers? A bit broader, did you already renew contracts of Scayle customers? Did the commissions change when you renewed those contracts? A bit more insight on Scayle would be appreciated.
Hello, 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. We will at levels still not in the numbers. Will come later on as we are onboarding, so it will be in H2. In terms of the take rate, no, the take rate is the same. We haven't seen the reduction on the take rate. As you know, we don't disclose revenue growth of Scayle, 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, do not hesitate to contact us and handing over to Anna to wrap it up for today's meeting.
Thank you, everyone, for joining. It is important that you take away that we are progressing very well in the executing of our strategy and delivering on our financial performance. We have done so in 2025, and Q1 in 2026 is further proof point that we deliver. 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, to create more value for our customers, for the partners, and for the company. Thank you very much and speak to you soon.
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