MILAN – Italy’s Giglio.com continued to feel the pinch of macroeconomic headwinds, dented consumer confidence, geopolitical instability and trade wars in 2025.
Amid an iffy outlook for luxury players, the online retailer, which functions as a marketplace and is listed on the AIM Italia program of the Milan Stock Exchange dedicated to small and medium-sized companies, logged a 14 percent drop in sales last year to 39.5 million euros, compared to 46.2 million euros in 2024.
However, preliminary first-quarter sales in 2026, updated until March 15, suggest an improvement in business, with total sales across geographies projected to decrease 3 percent as of March 31. The decline was offset by Europe, which is growing 22 percent, and Italy, up 6 percent. These regions are the best-performing ones, since the rest-of-the-world area is forecast to fall 36 percent.
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In fact, Italy and Europe — accounting for 73.2 percent of sales in 2025 — drove the top line last year, down 3 percent and 9 percent, respectively, and only partially offsetting a 28 percent decline in the rest of the world.
“It’s a challenging moment for our industry, which caters to an audience purchasing discretionary products. The company has demonstrated resilience in navigating these conditions. Focusing on Europe not only indicates that we have identified a region where the performance is stable but also reflects a strategic redirection of investments to ensure this region offsets performance challenges elsewhere,” said Giuseppe Giglio, chairman and co-chief executive officer of Giglio.com, in an interview.
Speaking about 2025 and current trends, Giglio said “the U.S. is facing significant challenges due to declining consumer confidence and widespread fears about an uncertain future. A weakened dollar, particularly against the euro, continues to impact our competitiveness with customers.”
He elaborated by explaining that “the dependence of major currencies on the dollar has led to a contraction, further exacerbated by the unpredictability of tariffs, which can only be described as chaotic. We are operating in the dark: forecasting, budgeting, and managing financial performance have become extraordinarily complex under these conditions.”
Giglio addressed the Middle East war, saying that the market, despite still a small portion of the business, “had been showing growth… but we now face unsustainable delivery delays, and were forced to halt orders in the region for 15 days after the first bombing.”
On the bright side, Europe continues to experience “strong growth, particularly in Italy, as it remains insulated from currency exchange issues and the complications of tariffs. Growth in these markets has been robust, in the double digits, driven in part by the struggles of our competitors,” he said.
Top-line contraction and a smaller bandwidth to implement further cost-containment and efficiency measures on variable costs dented the bottom line. In the 12 months to Dec. 31, adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization stood at a loss of 1.6 million euros compared with losses of 178,000 euros in 2024.
In 2025, the net loss stood at 2.47 million euros, compared to a loss of 1.27 million euros in 2024.
Despite facing ongoing disruptions caused by the macroeconomic landscape, Giglio.com said that last year it improved its average order value by 5 percent compared to 2024 and managed to increase customer retention by 2 percent.
“We are banking significantly on retention as acquiring new customers in the current context is particularly challenging,” said deputy CEO Vincenzo Troia.
The executive said that the company has implemented and is working toward integrating AI models across functions, including catalogue creation.
“Throughout the second half of last year we have leveraged AI to contain content production costs,” he said, highlighting that the marketplace hosts about 100,000 stock keeping units per season.
Last year, the e-tailer introduced a new omnichannel service to its marketplace, as reported. Called “Community Shopping,” the service allows Giglio.com partner stores to rely on the platform’s entire digital stock, resorting to fellow boutiques for products they do not carry or that are sold out.
The service is aimed at supporting brick-and-mortar boutiques in best serving their customers, thus expanding their ability to generate additional revenues through products that are not in their stock.
“We continue to pursue the strategy of positioning ourselves firmly within the ultra-premium segment. Our unique marketplace business model, legitimized by decades-long relationships with leading brands, remains our true competitive advantage,” Troia said. “A third key focus is expanding our presence and accelerating internationalization to capture niche markets — small ponds, if you will — that allow us to achieve a meaningful and rewarding yield,” he said.
Shares of Giglio.com closed down 1.85 percent to 0.53 euros on Thursday.
Giglio.com was established in 1996 and functions as a marketplace with around 200 brick-and-mortar stores as partners, mainly based in Italy, in addition to France and Spain, among other countries.
In addition to the Giglio.com business, the Giglio family independently operates five physical boutiques in Palermo, Italy — a business that began in 1965.