New Delhi, Feb 24 (IANS): Reliance Retail continues to execute strongly and has grown its retail footprint by 39 per cent (in sq.ft) since pandemic, added multiple brands and expanded its digital/new commerce, foreign brokerage, Bernstein said in a report.

Reliance Retail is a scale leader with annualized core retail of $18.2 Bn, 3x+ of nearest competition and a current growth at 50 per cent+ yoy.

It has shown consistent growth across categories -- grocery grew at double digit, Apparel & Electronics up 2x yoy. Digital/New commerce account for 20 per cent of core retail.

Showing a robust revenue growth, Q3 revenue was at Rs 577 Bn, 27 per cent qoq, 52 per cent yoy driven by festive season & strong demand across consumption categories. Footfalls recovered (95 per cent of pre-Covid levels).

Store operating days at 97 per cent in 3Q vs 89 per cent in 2Q. The company added 837 stores in the quarter with total store count of 14,412 (retail space of 40 mn sq ft).

Reliance Retail showed margins expansion with EBITDA margin at all-time highs of 7 per cent up 45 per cent qoq. Operating EBITDA margins expansion was led by 2x growth in high margin category like fashion & apparel /footwear. Higher order value (AOV) in consumer electronics also drove margin expansion.

The company's Digital scaled up with 20 per cent of core retail sales in 2QFY22. Digital includes AJIO, Reliancedigital.in, JioMart's B2C & B2B businesses. Digital orders grew 2x yoy. Merchant partners orders up 4x. New business / acquisitions had strong traction - Netmeds (daily orders up 1.6x, MAU up 2x), Zivame (100 stores, 9000 SKUs), Urban Ladder (2x yoy). JioMart's downloads consistently improving (11 Mn in 6 months).

"We expect Reliance Retail to grow at 30 per cent CAGR over FY22-25 while expanding margins. We are Outperform on Reliance Industries with a potential upside of 18 per cent", Bernstein said.