Dear Shareholders,
Dear Friends,

From left to right:
Rubin Ritter,
Robert Gentz,
David Schneider

Zalando keeps the pace high. Today we have built a business that reaches more than 23 million active customers. A business that provides jobs for more than 15,000 people. A business that has changed the fashion industry. We are incredibly proud of and thankful for what our team has achieved.

At the very core of our thinking is our customer. We offer the broadest assortment with almost unlimited choice, a high degree of fresh, in-season stock and the best possible experience along every single step of the way. We have introduced innovative delivery and return options and launched our fashion service, Zalando Plus.

For business partners, we kicked off Zalando Fulfillment Solutions, allowing them to leverage our logistics expertise and network, improving customer satisfaction and scaling their business internationally. Opening our infrastructure and expertise to third parties – and with this to a new set of customers – is one of the key ingredients of our platform strategy.

But on the brink of our 10th anniversary in the fall of 2018, we don’t look back – but think about tomorrow.

Our purpose, to "Reimage fashion for the good of all" guides us and our team every day to bring our strategy to life. And we know that success is closely linked to building the best possible products and services for customers and business partners alike. Zalando will continue to move fast. We believe the next leap is right ahead of us and encapsulates the personalization of experiences, enabling each customer to see their personal Zalando shop. It is a theme that will increasingly be part of our journey and we have dedicated this annual report “Your Zalando X” to underline our push towards more personalized experiences.

Over the past year we have paved the way for this next step, continuing our profitable growth with investments that focus on our customers, business partners and on building the underlying technology and logistics infrastructure. But what does the future hold for Zalando? In one word: growth.

We have chosen this path very early, and even today, at a much larger scale, we are certain it is the right way for us to maximize long-term value. The fashion industry is ripe with opportunities and we are willing to seize these to drive our business further.

We have our eyes firmly set on our goals: growing annually by 20–25% for the coming years, to double our business by 2020. We are convinced that further investments are necessary to expand our fashion ecosystem and increase the value we generate for all players connected to our platform. At the same time, we acknowledge that this increasingly depends on a policy framework that enables digital European companies to thrive, and we will play an active role in this debate.

Creating value for everyone involved also includes taking responsibility for the people and environment along our value chain. To live up to this responsibility, we took our sustainability strategy an important step forward: we defined impact visions and targets in our four pillars – people, fashion, environment and society. Using our unique mix of strengths in tech, fashion and operations we want to create sustainable business success and are determined to finding our role in contributing to a more transparent and sustainable fashion industry.

Our success as a company is deeply rooted in the excellence and drive of our entire team that works incredibly hard to move Zalando forward each day – thank you.

Berlin, February 26, 2018

Robert Gentz, David Schneider, Rubin Ritter