EBENEZERBusiness
CEO claims more customers buying more led to $175m surge in net profit as Ooshies craze boosts sales
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Business — Luca Ittimani
Woolworths has reported a $175m surge in net profit to $1.14bn, with profit margins rising and the Ooshies toys promotion boosting sales.
The company’s market value surged $2bn and briefly exceeded $50bn, its highest value since 2021, as investors bought in after it reported annual results on Wednesday.
Sales in the Australian supermarkets division rose 4.6% in the year to June, from $51.49bn to $53.85bn. The profit margin on earnings rose from to 5.5%, from 5.3%.
Its pre-tax earnings rose by $232m, to surpass $2.95bn.
Online sales rose 15.9% across the company, as it rolled out more in-store pick up and on demand options across the country.
Sign up for the Breaking News Australia email Woolworths and Coles have previously faced criticism for fattening profit margins during periods of high living costs at the expense of higher prices for its shoppers and low returns for its suppliers.
Chief executive Amanda Bardwell said Woolworths had not increased its profit margin by lifting shelf prices.
She said it had instead come from more customers buying more at Woolworths.
Shoppers had become permanently focused on low prices as cost-of-living pressures became engrained, she said.
“We’ve moved beyond a temporary phase into a new reality of entrenched value seeking,” Bardwell told reporters.
Big W returned to profit in the year to June, with pre-tax earnings at $64m, up from a $33m loss the year before. But the department store chain has seen its sales decline in the last eight weeks, despite its inclusion in the popular Ooshies program.
Woolworths attributed the drop to “ongoing cost-of-living pressures on households, particularly budget customers and weaker trade in the Everyday business”.
The Ooshies campaign, where shoppers were given a blind bag containing a plastic Disney character for every $30 they spent, won over supermarket customers.
Supermarket sales had accelerated in the eight weeks since the start of July, growing 7.6% above the prior year. Ooshies alone accounted for up to 2% of growth, or a boost of over $120m, assuming monthly sales averaged roughly $4bn.
The latest promotion, running from mid-July to mid-August, had hurt sales at competitor Coles .
Bardwell said the campaign had attracted shoppers who wouldn’t normally visit Woolworths but she said Ooshies would not be offered year-round.
“We don’t think we need to be running them all the time,” Bardwell said.
Woolworths’ results outshone Coles, which on Tuesday reported net profit rose 1% to $1.09bn in the year to June. Its supermarkets also increased their profit margin on earnings, from 5.3% to 5.7%.
Woolworths reported its “stockloss” including theft had declined in 2026 but it was still looking into the technology.
Bardwell said the company had reported 7,000 incidents of violence in one year and was still running a “technical test” of the facial recognition technology in its support office in New Zealand with staff consent.
The company’s market value surged $2bn and briefly exceeded $50bn, its highest value since 2021, as investors bought in after it reported annual results on Wednesday.
This report is published with credit to theguardian.com. Full available text from the wire is above. Read on theguardian.com →
Source: theguardian.com · Luca Ittimani. Published 26 Aug 2026, 02:16 am.
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