“We are excited to add an iconic brand such as Rag & Bone to Guess, further diversifying our portfolio with complementary customer bases and price points. We look forward to partnering with WHP Global to build on Rag & Bone’s heritage,” Guess CEO Carlos Alberini said. “Guess has an incredible platform with a strong global distribution network and outstanding licensee partners that will enable us to power the growth and expansion of the Rag & Bone business.”

Guess is No. 178 in the Top 1000, Digital Commerce 360’s ranking of North America’s leading retailers by online sales. Rag & Bone ranks No. 652.

Terms of the deal

Guess will buy all of Rag & Bone’s operating assets, the retailer said. Guess and WHP Global will also each own half of Rag & Bone’s intellectual property, according to a public statement. They will create a licensing agreement that gives Guess exclusive rights to manufacture and sell licensed products in exchange for royalties.

The retailers did not share all financial terms of the deal. However, Guess’ commitment in the agreement totals $56.5 million, with the potential for an additional $12.8 million dependent on Rag & Bone’s 2024 results.

The deal is expected to close during the first quarter of Guess’s 2025 fiscal year. 

Rag & Bone’s history

Rag & Bone was founded in New York City in 2002. As of February 2024, the retailer operates 34 stores in the U.S., and another two in the U.K. Its products are also sold through other retailers, including Nordstrom (No. 21 in the Top 1000), Saks Fifth Avenue (No. 28) and Neiman Marcus (No. 72).

In 2023, Rag & Bone generated $250 million in revenue, it said. The apparel company is privately held.

Following the acquisition, Rag & Bone will continue to be headquartered in New York City. It will operate as an independent fashion brand under the Guess umbrella, the retailer said.

“I am thrilled about this new relationship with Guess and WHP Global. Today marks the beginning of an exciting new chapter as Rag & Bone joins forces with a much larger international fashion company,” Rag & Bone chairman Andrew Rosen said in a written statement. “It’s a great opportunity for our team to take the brand to the next level, blending our unique styles and respective expertise to create new possibilities for Rag & Bone on a global scale.”

Why the acquisition is significant for Guess

Guess will make its first-ever acquisition in its 43-year history with Rag & Bone, co-founder and chief creative officer Paul Marciano said. 

In its most recent financial report, Guess said revenue grew 3% to 651.2 million in its Q3 ended Oct. 28. Guess CEO Alberini said the addition of Rag & Bone will improve the retailer’s financial position further.

“We expect the transaction to deliver earnings per share accretion in the first year and strong value creation for our shareholders for years to come,” he stated.

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All systems go for Go Autonomous expansion

Go Autonomous has secured $10.3 million in funding from Octopus Ventures and Ridge Ventures, with participation from existing investors EIFO and 42Cap, the company says.

“We’re excited to accelerate our product adoption in Europe and the U.K. and begin laying the groundwork for our expansion into the USA, thereby further reinforcing our commitment to revolutionizing the landscape of B2B commerce software,” says Go Autonomous founder and CEO Bjarke Ruse Sejersen.

Go Autonomous has developed artificial intelligence (AI) and software-as-a-service (SaaS) applications that it says identifies the intent of emails arriving in an inbox, extracts and structures the necessary information, and connects it into enterprise systems in real time, enabling end-to-end automation of quotes and orders.

“We saw the opportunity to simplify transactional communication without changing customer behavior,” says Ruse Sejersen. “Our platform not only streamlines B2B transactions but also significantly improves response times, resulting in a more efficient, profitable, and more sustainable growth — we call it Autonomous Commerce.”

Go Autonomous has established customers such as Danish pump manufacturer Grundfos, and Saint-Gobain Distribution Denmark.

The company did not release a U.S. market launch date.

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Parentheses indicate the merchant’s ranking in the Top 1000.

Amazon.com Inc. (No. 1)

Amazon beat expectations with earnings for its fiscal fourth quarter ended Dec. 31, 2023. Its net sales in the quarter grew 14% year over year to $170.0 billion.

Full-year sales grew 12% to $574.8 billion in 2023, up from $514.0 billion in 2022. Read more about Amazon’s earnings here.

Costco Wholesale Corp. (No. 6)

Costco said net sales grew 6.1% to $56.72 billion in its first fiscal quarter of 2024 ended Nov. 26, 2023. Ecommerce comparable sales grew 6.3% in the same period. E-gift cards, snacks and pet items were all strong in the ecommerce channel, the retailer said.

Read more on Costco’s earnings here.

Crocs Inc. (No. 104)

Crocs reported that revenue grew 1.6% to $960 million in its fiscal fourth quarter ended Dec. 31. Direct-to-consumer sales, including ecommerce, grew 6.8%, while wholesale declined 4.6%. Revenue grew 11.5% to $3.96 billion for the full year. 

CEO Andrew Rees says he expects personalization to be a major trend Crocs can capitalize on going forward. He pointed to Jibbitz sales, which grew 17% in 2023 to $250 million in sales.

Hanesbrands Inc. (No. 277)

Hanes reported net sales declined 12% to $1.3 billion in its fiscal fourth quarter ended Dec. 30. Activewear sales declined 24% in the quarter. For the full year, sales declined 9.6% to $5.6 billion.

“Our fourth-quarter performance did not meet our expectations as the sales environment proved to be more challenging than expected,” CEO Steve Bratspies said in a statement. 

Hasbro Inc. (No. 555)

Hasbro said revenue declined 23% to $1.2 billion in its fiscal fourth quarter ended Dec. 31. Revenue declined 15% for the year to $5.0 billion. In both periods, digital gaming grew but was offset by declines in consumer products and entertainment segments. Hasbro attributed some of the entertainment segment decline to lower film and TV revenue from strikes in the entertainment industry in 2023.

“The consumer remains value conscious and we anticipate entertainment will be less of a tailwind in the year ahead, behind a reduced box office slate,” CEO Chris Cocks said.

Shopify Inc.

Shopify revenue and gross merchandise volume (GMV) both increased in the ecommerce platform provider’s Q4, which ended Dec. 31, 2023. Its revenue and GMV both increased for the full fiscal year, too.

45 retailers in the Top 1000 use Shopify as an ecommerce platform. Read more about Shopify’s earnings.

Target Corp. (No. 5)

Third-quarter sales declined 4.9% for the mass merchant, to $25 billion from $26.12 billion in its fiscal third quarter ended Oct. 28. Meanwhile, Target online sales decreased 6% year over year.

Moreover, Target’s online sales declined 6.7% year over year for the first nine months of its fiscal year. Read more about Target’s earnings here.

Walmart Inc. (No. 2)

Walmart reported that U.S. online sales grew 24% for its fiscal 2024 third quarter ended Oct. 27. Global ecommerce sales grew 15% over the same period, while international ecommerce declined 3%.

U.S. comparable sales grew 4.9%, and total revenue grew 5.2% to $160.8 billion. Read more about Walmart’s earnings here.

Yeti Holdings Inc. (No. 135)

Yeti reported sales increased 16% to $519.8 million in its fiscal fourth quarter ended Dec. 30. DTC sales grew 11%, and wholesale increased 26%.

Full-year sales grew 4% to $1.66 billion. Sales through Amazon were strong, the retailer said, although it did not participate in Amazon’s October Prime sales event.

“The channel continues to prove effective in reaching both new and existing customers on the platform,” CEO Matt Reintjes said. Amazon makes up about 25% of DTC sales, Yeti said. However, higher fees and freight costs negatively impacted margins, the retailer said.

So what does it mean?

• Amazon has the power to make or break retailers that rely on online sales, as evidenced by Yeti. The retailer is feeling the pinch of higher fees, and it relies on the 25% of DTC sales that go through Amazon.
• The toy industry remains challenged. Hasbro fared worse than competitor Mattel, which forecasted further industry declines in 2024.

Ecommerce earnings calendar

Here’s when other ecommerce earnings are scheduled to report this quarter:

• Amazon.com Inc.: Feb. 1
• Best Buy Co Inc.: Feb. 29.
• Costco Wholesale Corp.: Dec. 14
• The Home Depot Inc.: Feb. 20
• Lowe’s Cos Inc.: Feb. 27
• Target Corp.: March 5
• Walmart Inc.: Feb. 20

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Those B2B buyers are delivering the message loud and clear: “We want an excellent digital user experience.”

And while sellers hear what buyers want, many organizations are having big problems with a range of ecommerce issues delivering a better web experience, says a new study of 400 companies by Zoovu, an artificial intelligence and ecommerce applications developer, and Forrester Research.

Aligning the B2B ecommerce experience

The study finds that B2B buyers now expect B2B experiences to align with the consumer experiences of their personal lives: quick, convenient, and personalized. Sellers know this, but they have, in large part, yet to digitally transform their selling motions. Their ecommerce operations are stuck without a meaningful way forward in a status quo that is hurting business, the survey says.

65% of surveyed organizations report that B2B ecommerce is “broken at their organization.” They cite a lack of an effective product data strategy for making products available and discoverable online as the primary factor behind this sentiment, including:

• 83% of respondents said their product data was incomplete, inconsistent, inaccurate, unstructured, or outdated.
• 81% said that an insufficient ecommerce platform amplified the problem of poor-quality data. The most common shortcomings were a lack of tools, an inability to manage product complexity, scale, and/or collect customer data from online buyers.

The research also shows that because of these challenges, B2B companies are forced to limit the amount of product discovery their buyers can engage with online. Not even half (44%) of respondents said their buyers have access to some form of self-discovery to evaluate products online.

The survey also revealed a significant opportunity to accelerate digital transformation within direct and indirect sales environments.

83% of surveyed companies say their corporate revenue required some degree of human interaction, whether it was traditional customer service/sales, assisted ecommerce where buyers turn to the sales team towards the end of their process, or digitally enabled selling, which uses digital tools to enhance traditional analog sales channels.

Other findings from Zoovu, Forrester

Aside from an inability to easily add more products into their ecommerce environments, B2B executives ranked additional challenges with their existing platforms as:

• Customer frustration (35%)
• Lower conversion rates (29%)
• Increased cost of sales (28%)
• Lost revenue (27%)
• Increased customer churn (25%)

Meanwhile, 73% of B2B buyers expect the same convenient online experience they get from buying consumer products. And B2B businesses ranked their ecommerce priorities for 2024. The top initiatives include:

• Providing more automated and personalized guidance to online buyers (80%)
• Improving demand generation (75%)
• Improving the ability to collect and use zero-party data (73%)

Incorporating AI into the B2B experience

More than three-quarters (79%) of respondents said they are looking to AI to improve the customer experience. Nearly three-quarters (74%) of those surveyed said they’re counting on AI to reduce the cost of sales and services. 71% of executives say they’re expecting AI to increase revenue.

“This research shows how essential it is for B2B businesses to invest in structuring and enriching product data to make their solutions more discoverable, wherever their buyers are,” says Zoovu CEO. James Novak.

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“This is a painful reality and not one that I take lightly,” Nike CEO John Donahoe said in the memo. “We are not currently performing at our best, and I ultimately hold myself and my leadership team accountable.”

Nike ranks No. 9 in the Top 1000, Digital Commerce 360’s database of the largest North American e-retailers by online sales.

Why Nike layoffs are happening

Nike’s layoffs come as part of an ongoing restructuring effort announced in December 2023. In that plan, the company outlined its intent to cut $2 billion in costs over three years.

“While interest in sport, health, wellness and comfort has never been stronger, we are in a highly competitive industry where speed and end-to-end execution is critical to win,” Donahoe wrote in his emailed announcement. “To compete, we must edit, shift and divest less critical work to create greater focus and capacity for what matters most.”

For Nike, that means reinvestment in areas of growth and streamlining budgets. As recently as its last earnings call in December, Nike chief financial officer Matthew Friend indicated that the company “saw softness in digital traffic and higher levels of promotional activity across the marketplace.” He also cited “indications of more cautious consumer behavior around the world in an uneven macroenvironment.”

Timeframe for Nike’s job cuts

The global layoffs will occur in two phases, CNBC reported. The first of those would begin Friday, with the second ending by the time Nike’s fiscal fourth quarter concludes.

The workforce reductions referenced in the Thursday memo would follow reported cuts from November and December, as reported by The Oregonian. The total number of workers laid off during that time was unknown.

Nike reported having 83,700 employees worldwide as of May 31, 2023.

Where layoffs will occur

Specific departments were not named in the memo, though recent leadership changes have touched design, innovation, marketing and technology operations, The Wall Street Journal reported. Earlier cuts reported by The Oregonian encompassed brand, engineering, human resources, innovation, recruitment and sourcing divisions.

Cuts in Europe, the Middle East and Africa would occur on unique timelines in observance of local labor laws. Meanwhile, retail and warehouse workers were not expected to be included in the cuts.

In a Nike statement shared with Complex, the company named areas of strength where it hopes to build, even as the workforce reduction continues.

“Nike’s always at our best when we’re on the offense,” the Nike spokesperson said. “The actions that we’re taking put us in the position to right-size our organization to get after our biggest growth opportunities as interest in sport, health and wellness have never been stronger.”

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A report from the Federal Economic Competition Commission (COFECE) — an agency in the Mexican government responsible for regulating anti-competitive behavior — found that Amazon and Mercado Libre control too much of the ecommerce market’s sales and transactions in the country, impeding new merchants from successfully entering the market.

Amazon and Mercado Libre are the largest online marketplaces in Mexico. Together, the report says, they control more than 85% of online marketplace sales and transactions in the country.

“We are aware of this preliminary report and are closely collaborating with COFECE,” Amazon said in a statement.

Mercado Libre issued a statement saying it was analyzing COFECE’s preliminary report, which the marketplace described as the start of the process. It also pledged its cooperation.

Amazon.com Inc. is No. 3 in the Global Marketplaces Database. MercadoLibre Inc. is No. 8. The Digital Commerce 360’s database ranks the largest online marketplaces around the world based on third-party gross merchandise value (GMV).

Amazon, Mercado Libre investigated in antitrust report

“There are no conditions of effective competition in the marketplace service market for sellers,” according to a translation of the preliminary opinion in the COFECE antitrust report. The report cites an investigation the commission held from March 31, 2023, to Oct. 27, 2023.

The report found that in Mexico, Amazon and Mercado Libre also:

• Have the ability to set prices
• Create barriers to entry into the market
• Exert significant competitive pressure over smaller competitors

It says although there are some competitors in the market, most of them are much smaller in size compared to Amazon and Mercado Libre. As such, the smaller competitors’ ability to exert competitive pressure is not significant, the regulator asserted. Additionally, it states that Amazon and Mercado Libre are the only competitors that have systems for collecting and processing large volumes of data. Those systems allow the companies to offer sellers various tools within their platforms. The tools then incentivize sellers to remain on the marketplaces. That ensures a sufficient number of users to generate and maintain industry effects, according to the report.

COFECE report proposes corrective measures

Among the barriers to competition cited, COFECE identified that Amazon and Mercado Libre artificially influence buyer behavior by offering streaming services in their loyalty programs. As a corrective measure, COFECE proposes the marketplaces dissociate streaming services from their memberships and loyalty programs.

Another barrier to competition is the lack of transparency in offer management. It asserts that Amazon and Mercado Libre’s marketplaces use algorithms to manage offers. The regulator is concerned that a lack of transparency in that process could undermine efficient market functioning.

“COFECE also orders Amazon and Mercado Libre to take all necessary and sufficient actions to ensure that sellers can find comprehensive information about the variables and weighting factors they consider in selecting the featured offer,” according to a Mexico Business News report on the COFECE findings and corrective measures.

Also at issue is the idea that a preference for proprietary logistics solutions creates a third obstacle for market competitors.

“Amazon and Mercado Libre give preferential treatment to products from sellers who use their fulfillment services,” the report said, according to Mexico Business News.

“A seller would be unable to hire a single company that offers fulfillment in a comprehensive manner, and from there participate in various sales channels,” the report said.

As a solution, COFECE proposes that the marketplaces modify the criteria for the “Prime” and “Full” labels on products eligible for delivery using the marketplaces’ fulfillment networks. It suggests modifying the criteria so the labels are not exclusively or preferentially assigned to sellers who use the marketplaces’ fulfillment services.

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It was “a phenomenal year for Shopify,” said president Harley Finkelstein in an earnings call with investors this week.

In North America, 45 of the Top 1000 online retailers use Shopify as their ecommerce platform. The Top 1000 is Digital Commerce 360’s database of the largest online retailers in the region by annual web sales. In 2022, those 45 online retailers combined for more than $8.29 billion in web sales.

Shopify revenue, profit and GMV grow in Q4 2023

In its fiscal Q4, Shopify revenue grew 24% year over year to $2.1 billion. Excluding Shopify’s logistics business, that growth rate shifts to 30%. It also marks the third consecutive quarter that growth (excluding logistics) has been greater than 25%, said Jeff Hoffmeister, chief financial officer. For the full year, Shopify revenue increased 26% over 2022 to $7.1 billion.

Of that $2.1 billion in Q4, $1.1 billion was gross profit. That’s 33% year-over-year growth in Q4 profit. Shopify gross profit in 2023 grew to $3.5 billion. That’s a 28% increase from $2.8 billion in 2022.

Meanwhile, Shopify GMV grew 23% in Q4 to reach $75.1 billion. That’s $14.2 billion more than Shopify’s GMV in Q4 2022. It’s also the largest quarterly GMV growth rate since the pandemic-driven rates in 2021, Hoffmeister said. For the full year, Shopify GMV grew 20% — or 38.7 billion — over 2022, to reach $235.9 billion in 2023.

In terms of channels, Shopify revenue from offline sources, which includes offline subscriptions and point-of-sale hardware, was $441 million. That’s more than five times what it was four years ago, Finkelstein said.

More than 70% of Shopify’s online checkouts in 2023 came from mobile devices, Finkelstein said. In Q4, the Shop App “nearly reached” $100 million in GMV in a single month, he said not specifying the exact figure.

Internationally, cross-border GMV was approximately 14% of total GMV in Q4. Europe, the Middle East and Africa represent 27% of Shopify’s total merchant base. More than $1.2 billion in Shopify revenue comes from sales in the region.

Shopify also noted growth in its B2B channel.

The biggest sales period: Black Friday through Cyber Monday

In the four days from Black Friday through Cyber Monday, Shopify merchants collectively generated $9.3 billion in sales, Finkelstein said. That’s 24% year-over-year growth. About 61 million consumers worldwide purchased from brands that use Shopify as their ecommerce platform, he said. More than 55,000 merchants had their highest-selling day ever on Shopify in that period, he added.

Part of that stemmed from scaling the platform to accommodate more traffic, Finkelstein said. Shopify handled, on average, 967,000 requests per second, he said. That’s the same as 58 million requests per minute. It’s also almost 80% higher than Shopify’s peak traffic two years ago, Finkelstein said.

Cyber Monday is still the largest online sales day in the U.S., with web sales reaching $12.4 billion in 2023, according to Adobe Analytics data. Cyber Monday 2023 online sales grew 9.6% over 2022’s $11.3 billion. Black Friday is the second largest at $9.8 billion in online sales. That represents 7.5% growth over 2022’s $9.12 billion.

Shop Pay and Shopify merchants

Finkelstein said that compared to 2022, Shopify has 35% more merchants from outside North America using its ecommerce platform. It has added brands including Dollar Shave Club, Authentic Brands Group, Buy Buy Baby, On Running and more, he said.

“In April, an external study by a big three consulting company confirmed that Shopify’s overall conversion rate surpassed the competition by up to 36% and on average is 15% higher than others,” Finkelstein said.

And when consumers use Shop Pay, conversion can grow by half, he said. More than 150 million users have signed up for Shop Pay, as of Q4 2023. For the quarter, it facilitated $18 billion in GMV. That’s up 58% year over year for the quarter and up 50% for the full year.

Shop Pay has facilitated a cumulative $127 billion since launching in 2017, according to Finkelstein.

Shopify 2023 highlights

“We cannot talk about 2023 without mentioning AI,” Finkelstein stated. “We launched our suite of AI-powered tools known as Shopify Magic, an AI shopping assistant on our Shop App and further embedded AI tools within Shopify to increase productivity and streamline administrative tasks that have saved our merchants and our team thousands of hours of work, enabling us to ship faster and make great decisions quicker.”

The ecommerce platform brought nearly a dozen AI-enabled tools to its Shopify Magic product suite in 2023.

Shopify also partnered with Amazon.com Inc. to release the “Buy with Prime” app for Shopify merchants. The deal gives merchants the choice to offer Buy with Prime directly within their Shopify Checkout. This provides Shopify merchants access to Amazon’s logistics network.

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The direct-to-consumer luggage brand is undergoing a larger restructuring that also includes “the elimination of a traditional executive team structure,” according to a statement shared with Retail Dive. 

Staffing changes were made because “the team recognizes the need for a more nimble approach amidst the changing consumer landscape,” according to the statement. 

“We’re reconfiguring the traditional exec team structure in order to promote better decision-making,” CEO Jen Rubio told Inc. “What I think this is doing is setting us up to be able to grow the right teams to work on the right projects.”

“Disruption has always been at the core of our company’s DNA,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “Away is dedicated to delivering the highest-quality travel products and experiences to our customers, and we believe that these steps will better position us to continue to be an innovative leader in the category.”

Away is No. 391 in the Top 1000, Digital Commerce 360’s ranking of North America’s leading retailers by online sales.

Changes at Away

Away held an earlier round of layoffs in May 2023. At the time, it cut 22 employees, including chief commercial officer Laura Willensky.

In 2023, the retailer also expanded its executive team. It hired Carissa Barrett as vice president of retail. She previously worked at Byredo, Saint Laurent, and Prada (No. 187 in Digital Commerce 360’s Europe Database). At the same time, Away hired Amanda Brody as vice president of brand. Brody previously worked at L’Oreal (No. 17 in Europe) and Charlotte Tilbury. 

In January 2023, Away brought on Carla Dunham as chief marketing officer with a mandate to increase marketing spending and capitalize on post-pandemic travel.

Away may have grown its executive team too quickly, Rubio told Inc.

“I was really proud that Away was able to attract people with such impressive accolades and such great experience,” she said. “Maybe I was in a little bit of a rush to have the company grow up so quickly, and in the midst of that, we lost a little bit of the magic that got us here.”

Away’s possible sale

Away was exploring a potential sale in 2023, Bloomberg reported.

Rubio told Inc. that’s not the plan for 2024. However, “there has to be some plan on the horizon” for an IPO or acquisition eventually, she said.

This year, Away will focus on increasing the number of product launches and working with retailers on wholesale, according to Rubio.

Other online retail and ecommerce layoffs

Away joins other retailers and marketplaces in announcing recent layoffs. EBay plans to lay off 1,000 workers, 9% of its total workforce. EBay ranks No. 6 in Digital Commerce 360’s Global Online Marketplaces database. The database ranks the 100 largest such marketplaces by third-party GMV.

Macy’s, Amazon, and Wayfair also all cut their workforces in the first month of 2024. In addition, REI announced that it would lay off 357 employees, about 2.2% of the retailer’s total workforce, The Seattle Times reported.

Macy’s ranks No. 17 in the 2023 Digital Commerce 360 Top 1000. Amazon ranks No. 1, Wayfair ranks No. 10, and REI ranks No. 67.

Levi Strauss (No. 191) also said it would lay off 10% to 15% of its corporate workforce, and Estee Lauder (No. 43) will lay off 3% to 5%.

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The SEC filing shows that Instacart’s plan “includes a reduction of approximately 250 employees, representing approximately 7% of the company’s global workforce as of January 31, 2024, with most of these reductions expected to occur by March 31, 2024.”

Instacart layoffs and executive-level changes

Instacart estimates the restructuring plan will cost $19 million to $24 million in non-recurring charges, according to the SEC filing. That’s predominantly tied to “cash expenditures for employee transition and severance payments and employee benefits.” Although Instacart will have to incur expenses this year due to accounting rules, it said $17 million to $22 million of the expenses will affect cash flow in the future.

In the same filing, Instacart noted that chief operating officer Asha Sharma informed the company of her decision to resign, effective March 1. Instacart said in the filing that it does not plan to hire or appoint a new COO “at this time.”

CEO Fidji Simo said in a Feb. 13 earnings call with investors that its chief technology officer (Varouj Chitilian) and chief architect (JJ Zhuang) are also departing the company. Simo said the company is “taking the opportunity to streamline my management team and create more autonomous teams with all the levers they need to execute on our critical initiatives.”

She added that the company will look for a new CTO. As with the COO role, though, it does not expect to backfill the chief architect position, she said.

Instacart Q4 results

Simo said on the call that Instacart fulfillment speed improved in Q4, adding that the fill rate increased for the sixth consecutive quarter. Fill rate is the percentage of customer orders that a business can ship right away, without any backorders, stockouts, or missed sales.

Instacart grew orders 5% year over year in Q4 to reach 70.1 million. Gross transaction volume (GTV) also increased year over year, up 7% to $7.89 billion. Instacart also announced $803 million in total Q4 revenue. That’s a 6% year-over-year increase that represents 10.2% of GTV.

Instacart transaction revenue grew 6% year over year to reach $560 million. That represents 7.1% of GTV for the quarter.

Instacart 2023 full-year results

For the full year, Instacart grew orders to 269.2 million, a 3% year-over-year increase. Instacart GTV grew 5% over 2022 to reach $30.32 billion.

Meanwhile, Instacart total revenue in 2023 grew 19% year over year, reaching $3.04 billion. That represents 10% of GTV. Transaction revenue represented 7.2% of GTV, as it grew 20% year over year to reach $2.17 billion.

Recent Instacart announcements

Instacart will partner with grocery chain Hy-Vee to offer same-day delivery, Hy-Vee announced days before Instacart’s earnings call. Hy-Vee will benefit from the nearly 600,000 shoppers in Instacart’s network that can pick up, pack and deliver orders, Instacart said.

Meanwhile, Instacart announced it will be available for Whole Foods deliveries in select parts of Canada.

“Our mission at Instacart is to create a world where everyone has access to the food they love, and working with beloved retailers like Whole Foods Market helps us make that mission a reality,” Chris Rogers, chief business officer at Instacart, had said in a released statement.

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Rob Saltiel, president and CEO, MRC Global Inc.

“Our revenue grew for a third straight year in 2023 to $3.4 billion, and we generated $181 million of operating cash flow, resulting in our lowest net debt level ever as a public company,” president and CEO Rob Saltiel said in a statement on the company’s fourth quarter and fiscal year ended Dec. 31.

MRC Global, which launched in 1921, emphasizes its global supply chain expertise and its “robust digital platform” for its ability to offer over 300,000 SKUs from over 8,500 suppliers for approximately 10,000 customers worldwide. Its ecommerce site, MRCGO, processes orders for products ranging from steel and polyethylene pipe to related valves and fittings.

In the fourth quarter, MRC reported a 12% year-over-year drop in total sales to $768 million. MRC said ecommerce accounted for 65.5% of U.S. orders and 53% worldwide. That’s up from 50.2% of worldwide orders in the year-earlier quarter.

Ecommerce drives a big share of sales

MRC didn’t break out the percentages of Q4 2023 U.S. of sales transacted online. Based on its reported figures for 2023 and 2022, Digital Commerce 360 estimates ecommerce accounted for about $340 million in Q4 2023 sales.

In its 2022 annual report, MRC said ecommerce accounted for 41% of total Q4 2022 revenue, or $356.3 million out of total sales of $869 million, while accounting for half of customer orders.

For the full year 2023, MRC said total sales grew 1% year over year to $3.41 billion. Saltiel noted on an earnings call today that, despite the drop in Q4 sales, “we maintain strong profit margins and cash generation that exceeded our expectations.”

He added, “We have seen a meaningful improvement in our backlog of new orders over the first few weeks of 2024. This gives us optimism that our business is stabilizing, and we expect to return to growth in the coming quarters.”

For the fourth quarter ended Dec. 31, MRC reported:

• Gross profit of $153 million, down 3.2% from a year earlier. But a sharp drop in the cost of sales led to a gross profit margin of 20.0%. That’s up from 18.2% a year earlier.
• Net income of $21 million, unchanged.

For the full year, MRC reported:

• Gross profit of $690 million, up 13.1%.
• Net income of $114 million, up 52%.

Percentage changes may not align exactly with dollar figures due to rounding. Check back for more earnings reports. Here’s last quarter’s MRC Global report.

Paul Demery is a Digital Commerce 360 contributing editor covering B2B digital commerce technology and strategy. paul@digitalcommerce360.com.

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