Despite half-yearly profits of AU$30 million, retail giant David Jones's online store made very little in the grand scheme of things. However it's not all doom and gloom for the Web site.

"It's moving slowly, we're not intending to rush delivery," David Jones' General Manager Corporate Affairs Jill Campbell said.

Launched only six months ago, Campbell says David Jones does not expect to make profits on the site for at least two years.

David Jones announced this week that it made AU$30 million in profit in its half yearly earnings, ending January this year.

However, the store's retail Web site, coupled with the first of its food chain outlets, contributed just AU$4.4 million in sales revenue out of an overall AU$831.6 million, a 0.5 percent contribution to the overall sales earnings.

"They're both such small businesses in the scheme of things," Campbell said.

Campbell told ZDNet Australia, due to market competition there has not been a breakdown of the figures achieved by the online business alone, which is the reason the results have been combined with the earnings from the food outlet, which opened in Victoria five months ago.

"It's a fairly competitive situation, that's why we are keeping the figures to ourselves," she said.

David Jones's retail Web site shares the market with e-tailers such as wishlist, dstore and Coles.

Research organisation Red Sheriff surveyed the top ten retail Web sites in Australia for the month of February, in which David Jones sits in eight place, behind Wishlist, dstore and Coles.

"Our main focus is to manage risk at the moment, rather than reward," Campbell told ZDNet Australia.

The Web site is David Jones's second attempt at delivering an online presence, the first of which was halted in 1997 due to a significant overhaul of the management team, to re-focus on its core business.

Campbell says this time around, David Jones is taking its time in delivering its online brand, launching with limited products just before Christmas and staggering the rollout of more categories throughout the year.

"It's different to the first time around, it has very strong links to the core business in terms of leverage,

"It's important for us that people don't have different experience online than when they are in the store, its just another way to talk to customers," Campbell said.

Campbell believes that David Jones's existing relationships with companies through the bricks and mortar business has enabled the online store to get the products which stand-alone e-tailers have not been able to do.

Copyright © 2009 CBS Interactive, a CBS Company. All Rights Reserved.
ZDNET is a registered service mark of CBS Interactive. ZDNET Logo is a service mark of CBS Interactive.