Bolton-based online electrical retailer, AO, has announced it had a hugely successful financial year.

The Lostock company announced the financial results for the year ended March 31 2021 recently with huge growth across the UK and Europe.

It’s revenue across the group increased 62 per cent aided by the shift to online shopping over the pandemic with the company saying they welcomed over 2 million customers over this financial year.

Over 1,200 roles were also created across the business.

‘Small domestic appliances’, ‘consumer electronics’, and ‘gaming’, all grew by over 100 per cent, helping AO achieve a year of bumper growth.

AO’s founder and chief executive, John Roberts, said: “It’s been a step change year for AO in which we’ve achieved significant strategic, operational and financial progress. The early and bold investments we made in capacity, infrastructure and people returned increased revenues by 62 per cent, and grew Adjusted EBITDA (before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortization) by 191 per cent across the group.

“Most importantly, we rose to the challenge for the people who matter most, our customers, and we relished the opportunity to impress two million more of them in the period.

“Delivering brilliantly for customers is at the heart of our mission to become the global destination for electricals. We firmly believe that once people experience a better way to buy electricals, they are unlikely to return to old ways of shopping. Our vertically integrated business model offers substantial operational leverage which means all incremental growth feeds our flywheel, generating cash to invest back into our business for customers.

“Coming out of the pandemic, the direction of travel is firmly with AO, and our proven ability to build scale and drive growth gives us confidence to look towards further European expansion over the next five years. We’ll continue to make choices that create long-term value for our share owners, as well as make our mums proud.

“I would like to thank all our AOers for living The AO Way during the year and our trading partners who shared our desire to use these testing times as a chance to deepen relationships.”

Mr Robert’s started AO after a bet in a Bolton pub on Christmas Eve 2000 with the company now on the London Stock Exchange.