Just Eat Takeaway returns to profit despite warning of ‘challenging’ consumer backdrop
Just Eat Takeaway has returned to profitability earlier than expected, although the food delivery platform warned of a “challenging” consumer backdrop in the months to come.
The London-based firm said it processed 235m orders in the third quarter of 2022, an 11 per cent dip on the year previously, with bosses pointing to the end of Covid-19 restrictions.
Gross transaction value (GTV) increased two per cent in the third quarter, driven by customers spending more on average with each order.
The platform said it currently did not “really see an impact yet” of the “difficult environment for consumers” on order behaviour, CEO Jitse Groen told CityA.M.
The CEO said “getting out of Covid” was still the major trend in terms of consumer habits, with customers ordering more from delivery services during the pandemic.
“People are no longer locked in their houses”, Groen added, using the example of London customers now picking up food at Pret on the way to work.
The delivery platform said it would be well capitalised to naviggate the macroeconomic pressures and “to capture profitable future growth”.
It revealed plans for a $1.5bn sale of its 33 per cent stake in Brazilian food ordering app iFood, to an affiliate of Prosus, which half owns the brand alongside investment firm Movile.
The company said it currently had a hiring freeze in place as the UK economy braces for a tough winter.
Bosses hiked profit guidance for the full year last month, anticipating positive adjusted EBITDA in the second half of 2022, with a previous forecast of a margin between 0.5 per cent to minus 0.7 per cent of GTV.
Just Eat continues “to actively explore the partial or full sale” of its US arm Grubhub, a move that has been strongly urged by some of the platform’s activist investors.
However, the business stressed that “there can be no certainty that any such strategic actions will be agreed or what the timing of such agreements will be.”
Groen said it would be lowering prices on products from certain restaurants in the UK, owing to making efficiencies.