The former clothing group Esprit has a high drop in sales in the past half of the year. The reason is the elimination of the license income from European trademark rights.
Esprit continues to shrink
After the global bankruptcies and closures of branches and branches last year, Esprit Holdings Ltd in Hong Kong only manages the licenses for the Esprit brand. In the first half of the year, the company posted a decline in sales of $ 49.6 million Hong Kong (5.4 million euros) to 6.6 million Hong Kong Dollar (720,000 euros) compared to the same period last year.
The company declared the decline in sales with the loss of license income from European trademark rights. According to the insolvency proceedings of the company’s former German subsidiaries last year, they will no longer be taken into account in the balance sheet, it was said in a annual report last week.
The bottom line was that the company remained a profit of around 22 million Hong Kong dollars (2.4 million euros) from the abandoned business areas after significant cost reduction, of which $ 1.3 million $ (140,000 euros).
After operating operational business activities, the company only employs the equivalent of 38 full -time employees. A year ago there were still more than 500 employees.
Back in China
However, Esprit Holdings Limited retains trademark rights for all regions outside of Europe and wants to further expand its brand management business oriented towards licensing.
A license agreement for the Chinese market had already been signed a few months ago. The business partner not mentioned in the annual report now focuses on building a presence on the most important e-commerce platforms such as Tmall, Douyin, Jd.com and Vip.com. At the same time, the autumn/winter collection 2025 is being developed and the license partner already checks potential sub-licenses for certain product categories.
A license partner has already been found for the North America region. The existing license agreement for Latin America was also renewed.
Insolvency in Canada
In the first half of the year, the company also ended its business activities in Canada with the initiation of insolvency proceedings in June and also focuses on the license business there.
The Esprit Holdings will hope for increasing income from the license model in the future, especially through the proceeds from the expansion to China.
In the future, the company plans to continue to advance the license business with other partners, but also to examine opportunities to expand its brand portfolio.