Wayfair’s losses widened despite posting a surge in sales and a record-breaking promotional day in its first quarter.

The online retailer’s sales swelled 39% year on year to $1.9bn (£1.5bn) during the three months to March 31 as pre-tax losses widened to $199,794m (£153,651m) from $107,775m (£82,878m) for the same period the previous year.

The homeware retailer’s active users rose 39% year on year to 16.4 million customers with 8.2 million orders fulfilled over the period, an increase of 38.6% year over year.

Wayfair chief executive and co-founder Niraj Shah said: “Our ongoing investments in building our logistics infrastructure, deepening our product offering and finding new ways to serve our customer are just a few of the many areas that are driving the momentum we are seeing today.”

The online retailer celebrated record-breaking sales after it launched Way Day – a 36-hour flash discount sale – in April. Way Day was started in North America last year and was rolled out in Germany and the UK this year.

“Way Day, our biggest retail event of the year, was a tremendous success for the business, breaking our record for the highest revenue grossing day in company history,” Shah said.