The Owner of Zara, Bershka and Pull & Bear Will Close 1.200 Stores
By Marko Vidrih on The Capital
The Spanish company Inditex, which owns the brands Zara, Pull & Bear, Massimo Dutti, Bershka, Oysho and others, will close up to 1.200 stores worldwide and will direct all efforts to the growth of online sales. The quarantine measures introduced in the world to prevent the spread of Covid-19 are to blame — the company’s sales dropped by 44%.
Inditex said it will close about 1.200 of its stores, mainly in Asia and Europe. At the same time, the company also plans to open 450 new stores. As a result, the number of outlets will decrease from 7412 to 6700–6900 after the reorganization. According to Inditex, they are not planning to reduce the number of staff, they will offer other functions to personnel from closed stores, for example, processing and sending online orders.
Inditex, one of the world’s largest clothing retailers, was hit hard during the pandemic. Sales fell 44% to 3.3 billion euros during the first quarter of the fiscal year (from February 1 to April 30). The net loss for the quarter was 409 million euros. Almost 25% of its stores remained closed in early June.
However, according to Inditex, the growth in sales on the Internet slightly offset the decline in sales. Online sales grew 50% year on year during the quarter and 95% year on year in April. So now the company plans to focus on the development of e-commerce.
It was previously reported that the fortune of Amancio Ortega, the founder of Inditex, during the quarantine period increased by $5.2 billion and amounted to $60.5 billion.
Author: Marko Vidrih
Featured image credit: Unsplash
