Dawn delivery pioneer Kurly posts 1st-ever quarterly profit

Kurly Inc., a pioneer in South Korea’s dawn delivery market, has posted its first-ever quarterly profit, bucking a slowdown in private consumption and intensifying competition in the e-commerce sector.

The turnaround for the 15-year-old online mall operator was attributed to steady growth in its core food business, as well as diversification into beauty products, foreign luxury goods and fulfillment services for third-party vendors.

In the January-March quarter, it earned 1.8 billion won ($1.2 million) in consolidated operating profit, reversing a shortfall of 187.6 million won the year prior, according to its regulatory filing on Tuesday.

Revenue climbed 7.7% to 580.7 billion won, versus 539.2 billion won in the same period of last year.

Since entering the beauty sales market in late 2022, the gourmet food app has expanded its offerings to fashion and interior goods in 2023, followed by foreign luxury brands such as Louis Vuitton, Bottega Veneta and Burberry in 2024.

Its gross merchandise value (GMA), or the total value of all goods sold on Kurly, jumped 14.7% on-year to 844.0 billion won in the first quarter.

That sharply outpaced the average 2.6% growth by domestic online shopping malls during the same period, according to Statistics Korea.

Kurly's food business reported a 16% rise on-year in first-quarter GMA. The Beauty Kurly division saw its GMA rise 23% on-year, maintaining double-digit growth for a second straight year. 

It has also launched a commission-based third-party marketplace (3P), enabling vendors to ship products directly to customers without using Kurly’s delivery network.

Its earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization increased 2.3% on-year to 6.7 billion won in the first quarter.

In 2024, Kurly narrowed losses to 18.3 billion won from 143.6 billion won a year before.

Write to Jae-Kwang Ahn at ahnjk@hankyung.com

Yeonhee Kim edited this article.