French luxury conglomerate Kering, owned by the Pinault family, is all set to become a pure-player in luxury and wants to sell the last of its sports and lifestyle acquisitions. In a recent announcement, the company has said that it is looking to sell its skate-infused streetwear brand Volcom. In a statement from the Group, it said:“ In accordance with Kering’ s strategy to fully dedicate itself to the development of its luxury houses, Volcom no longer constitutes a core asset and Kering has initiated a disposal process.” Kering had bought Volcom in 2011 for US $ 608 million after having acquired Puma in |
2007 and Cobra Golf in 2010 as a way to expand into the booming world of sportswear. However, in 2017, François-Henri Pinault exited |
Puma’ s board and in January 2018, it was announced that Kering is selling its majority stake in Puma to focus on other higher margin |
brands in its portfolio. At the time of announcing Puma’ s dismissal, a press statement was released that said,“ This proposal will allow us to strengthen our status as the best in the sector. Kering is aiming to continue growing and developing its ensemble of luxury houses in couture, leather goods, watches and jewellery, leveraging its higher cash flow generation and a solid financial situation.” At the moment, Kering owns some of fashion’ s biggest heritage brands in Europe including Gucci, Yves Saint Laurent, Balenciaga, Alexander McQueen, amongst several others. |
After reporting a massive 57 per cent increase in its online sales at 1.5 billion Euros in 2017, Germanybased sportswear company Adidas is considering to sell more products through e-stores. This was revealed by its Chief Executive |
Kasper Rorsted in an interview.“ The retailer will contract the number of its store slightly and maintain better quality stores,” Rorsted was quoted as saying by Financial Times. Even though the sports company is shrinking its |
physical footprint, it will open or refashion stores in key locations to enhance the customer’ s shopping experience. The retailer, which currently operates 2,500 stores globally and 13,000 additional mono-branded franchise stores, is |
planning to double its online sales from 1.6 billion Euros last year to 4 billion Euros( US $ 4.91 billion) by 2020. The group is hiring 200 staff with a digital focus who can help the company to achieve the target.
A smartphone app was earlier introduced by Adidas to promote personalisation across its online community, it will now be launched in France, Spain and Canada this year; It is currently available in the US, the UK and Germany. The CEO even termed Adidas’ website‘ the most important store we have in the world’. However, it remains to be seen how Adidas maintains its growth rate to compete against the likes of Nike and Under Armour, which have been rapidly eating into Adidas’ sports market in the US.
|