The enigmatic and impressive Cazoo continues to make the headlines, this time perhaps not for the right reason. In what is essentially the first opportunity for us mere mortals to cast our beady eyes over what Cazoo is doing we see that for H1 2021 it has posted a loss of £102m, far worse than the £31m loss of H1 2020.
But look closer and we see that sales have improved hugely. Look at these rises in sales, to the public and to the trade. And they’re getting more profit per vehicle than before.
Summary Results:
| H1 2021 (unaudited) | H1 2020 (unaudited) | Change | |
| Vehicles Sold | 20,454 | 4,084 | +401% |
| Retail | 16,557 | 3,234 | +412% |
| Wholesale | 3,897 | 850 | +358% |
| Revenue (£m)^1 | 248 | 40 | +521% |
| Retail (£m) | 208 | 37 | +464% |
| Wholesale (£m) | 13 | 2 | +409% |
| Other (£m) | 27 | 1 | +5,047% |
| Retail GPU (£)^2 | 315 | (355) | +670 |
| Gross Profit (£m) | 11 | (1) | 12 |
| Net Income (£m) | (102) | (31) | (71) |
^1 ‘Retail revenue’ excludes £7 million of income where Cazoo sold vehicles as an agent for third parties and only the net commission received from those sales is recorded within ‘Retail revenue’. ‘Other revenue’ includes ancillary products, subscription, remarketing and servicing income. ^2 Retail GPU (Gross Profit per Unit) is derived from retail and ancillary product revenues, divided by retail units sold (net of returns).
Boss Alex Chesterman said: “We achieved record results in H1 with continued strong growth in revenue and gross profit per unit. Consumers continue to embrace the selection, transparency and convenience of buying cars entirely online, generating record revenue of £248m during the half, up 521 per cent year on year.
“Our gross profit per unit grew substantially during the first half, up £670 year on year, as a result of continued operational improvements. We expect operational efficiencies to continue to drive further gross margin improvement and we remain on track to achieve revenue approaching $1 billion in 2021.”
So let’s keep this in perspective, They’re huge and they’re going to get even more huge. It’s the way the market is going. These losses are teething troubles. Aren’t they?