Latest News & Analysis – Page 302

  • Article

    Crocs Redeems Employees’ Shares

    2009-04-09T00:00:00Z

    Crocs announced last Thursday that it would buy out the stock options taken by its employees with an exercise price of $10.50 a share or more. Assuming that all of the just over 5 million unvested eligible options are tendered and accepted, the company will spend about $315,000 in cash ...

  • Article

    Europe Launches A Bigger Program To Combat Counterfeiting

    2009-04-09T00:00:00Z

    The Council of the European Union in Brussels adopted a new customs action plan against counterfeiting for 2009-12 last month. It has two main aims: the protection of the health and safety of consumers, and the protection of innovation, economic activity, competitiveness and jobs. The council has four major foci ...

  • Article

    Mammut Helps Its Parent Company In A Rough Year

    2009-04-09T00:00:00Z

    The Mammut Sports Group saw its own sales rise by 8.8 percent to 192.6 million Swiss francs (€126.3m-$171.5m) for 2008. Excluding currency effects, it would have been double-digit growth. Rolf Schmid, MSG’s chief executive, explained that this effect comes from the Swiss franc, which has performed strongly in comparison with ...

  • Article

    Timberland Opens First Store In Austria; Strengthens Its Eco Policy

    2009-04-09T00:00:00Z

    Timberland has opened its first franchised retail store in Austria. The store follows the company’s eco-friendly concept, called “The Market Place,” and is located in Salzburg’s prestigious Getreidegasse, the touristic lane in the heart of the city, just around the corner from the house where Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was born. ...

  • Article

    Globetrotter Weighs Now More Than 200 Kilos

    2009-03-25T00:00:00Z

    Globetrotter Ausrüstung, Europe’s largest multi-channel specialty outdoor retailer, increased its sales after VAT from €205 million in the last fiscal year ended Feb. 28, compared with €178 million the year before. The increase of around 15 percent exceeded the targeted growth of 10 percent. Both the mail order and the ...

  • Article

    British Oia Re-invents Itself, But Plans No Own Show

    2009-03-25T00:00:00Z

    As reported in the last issue, the British Outdoor Industries Association has appointed Louise Ramsay as its new director. The position had been vacant for more than one year, so the new director’s agenda is a very long one. Ramsay explained to The Compass the first steps that the OIA ...

  • Article

    Blacks’ Update Shows Outdoor Group Way Ahead

    2009-03-25T00:00:00Z

    Blacks Leisure Group has updated investors about its own status since early January, when it announced its results for the Christmas season. Since then, it has performed as expected, with the outdoor group excelling and the boardwear group continuing to falter. The newly formatted outdoor stores have been 21 percent ...

  • Article

    The Industry Discovers Tv To Appeal To The Mass Market

    2009-03-25T00:00:00Z

    It seems to be a fast-growing trend in the outdoor industry to reach the general public through spots on television. Three big brands have just announced at once that they are going into TV marketing soon. On March 19, Adidas went on the air with a new format of ...

  • Article

    Profits Drop For The Parent Of Peak, Prompting Action In Spain And China

    2009-03-25T00:00:00Z

    First-half results are in for IC Companys, and while it managed to eke out a 1 percent increase in sales to 2,041 million Danish kroner (€273.9m-$373.2m), the operating profit dropped by a third to DKK 202 million (€27.1m-$36.9m). The unfavorable market was blamed for the decline, and comparable store sales ...

  • Article

    Morpho Is Setting Sails

    2009-03-25T00:00:00Z

    Morpho, a French brand of snowshoes, won Ispo’s BrandNew Awards for its women’s sailing pants, developed under the company’s accessory brand Sailing for Women. The sailing apparel market is a relatively difficult one, with very few players, because the clothing is highly technical. Morpho’s sailing gear has padding in areas ...

  • Article

    The Booming Chinese Market Is Well Prepared For A Slowdown

    2009-03-04T00:00:00Z

    Regardless of the expected slowdown in the growth of the Chinese sports market this year, interest in the country’s outdoor sports business continues to thrive, as witnessed at the Ispo China fair in Beijing last month. About 13,500 visitors attended the fifth edition of Ispo China, which was ...

  • Article

    Tnf Emea Posts Strong Growth; Appoints New Managers

    2009-03-04T00:00:00Z

    Elaborating on the results recently published by VF Corporation for 2008, The North Face EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa) says its own sales in the territory grew by 12 percent to €217 million, with a particularly strong increase of 16 percent in Italy. The number of employees at the ...

  • Article

    British Oia Has A New Manager

    2009-03-04T00:00:00Z

    The British Outdoor Industry Association has appointed Louise Ramsay as its new director. The 35-year-old will assume the position by March 9. In fact the job was vacant since Roger Southcott dropped out in fall 2007; since then the federation was busy restarting its business. Ramsay started her career ...

  • Article

    Globetrotter Opens Its First Store For Kids

    2009-03-04T00:00:00Z

    The Hamburg-based chain is ready to open its first store exclusively dedicated to kids and children-related products. The new store is scheduled for early May and will have a selling surface of around 400 square meters right next to the company’s headquarters. According to Thomas Lipke, managing partner of ...

  • Article

    The “Paw” Reports Another Year Of Record Sales

    2009-03-04T00:00:00Z

    Jack Wolfskin, the brand with the paw in its logo, has accomplished another year marked by skyrocketing sales. Global sales soared by 30 percent to €205.5 million in 2008. Turnover in Germany, still by far the brand’s largest market, grew in line with the global evolution of the sales by ...

  • Article

    Maier Is Fit For The Future, But Puts Two Brands On Hold

    2009-03-04T00:00:00Z

    Maier Sports, the German apparel brand, believes it is prepared for the future after filing for insolvency under the German bankruptcy code in late 2008. Its operating business has been transferred to a new company that bears the name of the old one: Maier Sports GmbH & Co. KG. The ...

  • Article

    Garmin’S Sales Are Down, But Not In Outdoor And Sports

    2009-03-04T00:00:00Z

    Garmin, the globally leading manufacturer of GPS solutions, faced a slowdown in sales in the last quarter of 2008. Overall revenues slipped from $1.22 to 1.05 billion, mainly due to a major decrease of the automotive and mobile division, the company’s largest unit, by 17 percent to $828 million. Aviation ...

  • Article

    Further Commotion In British Sports Retailing

    2009-03-04T00:00:00Z

    Blacks Leisure Group has released a statement that it had received a number of proposals for the acquisition of the company, but it has declined to disclose their origin. According to reports in the British media, which could not be confirmed, the main candidates are Mike Ashley, the entrepreneur ...

  • Article

    Crocs Has Huge Loss On Forex Losses, Margin Erosion

    2009-03-04T00:00:00Z

    The net loss was $33.2 million against income of $38.3 million for the final quarter ended Dec. 31 as sales plunged by 43.9 percent to $126.1 million. While that was higher than what analysts forecast (sales of $100 million to $120 million), it nonetheless closes out a disastrous year for ...

  • Article

    Deckers’ Gains Driven By Strong Ugg Sales

    2009-03-04T00:00:00Z

    Deckers plans to make aggressive investments in UGG, Simple and Tsubo in an effort to gain market share in 2009 after closing out a record year with fourth-quarter net income of $40.5 million compared with $35.4 million from the year before. Sales jumped by 56.3 percent to $303.5 million. For ...