Gerry Weber International AG was able to increase its sales in the first six months of the current 2022 financial year despite the ongoing corona measures at the beginning of the year and the effects of the Ukraine war and rising inflation. This emerges from the current annual report, which the clothing supplier from Halle in Westphalia presented on Thursday.
“The development after the gradual lifting of all corona-related restrictions shows that our customers accept our ageless collections very well. The effect can be felt in all sales channels,” said Angelika Schindler-Obenhaus, Managing Director at Gerry Weber. “Our first participation in the Premium Fair in Berlin and the collections presented there met with a very positive response from potential and existing customers and confirms us in continuing to implement our strategy consistently.”
Sales growth in all areas
In the first half of 2022, Gerry Weber was able to increase group sales by 48.4 percent compared to the same period last year to EUR 157 million. The domestic market accounted for 48.9 percent of total sales, compared to 43.5 percent in the same period last year. The proportion in Austria and Switzerland, on the other hand, fell by two percent from 10.6 percent to 8.6 percent compared to the first six months of last year.
Gerry Weber was able to record growth in all of its sales channels. In the retail sector, which includes its own stores, the company increased its sales by 78.8 percent to EUR 75.8 million compared to EUR 42.4 million in the same period of the previous year. The growth was made possible in particular by the permanent opening of the shops – after the corona restrictions last year. The wholesale partners also benefit from this, so that sales in this area increased by 26.2 percent from EUR 43.2 million to EUR 54.5 million. Gerry Weber was also able to continue to grow in online trading and achieved sales growth of 27.4 percent to 26.5 million euros.
In terms of earnings, Gerry Weber was able to reduce the loss to 12.4 million euros compared to 24.7 million euros in the first half of 2021. Reported earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) increased to EUR 19.6 million compared to EUR 7.5 million in the same period of the previous year. The normalized – i.e. adjusted for the effects of the IFRS 16 accounting standard – EBITDA reached a level of EUR 2.2 million. In the first six months of 2021, this was -9.2 million euros.
For the current financial year, the company already increased its forecast at the beginning of July “due to the expected successful implementation of further optimization measures in ongoing business”. Gerry Weber expects EBITDA in the negative single-digit million range for the financial year 2022. In terms of sales, Gerry Weber expects an amount between EUR 315 million and EUR 340 million In the past financial year, group sales amounted to EUR 262.7 million.