PARIS (Agefi-Dow Jones)–Luxury group Kering on Thursday reported sales up 27.4% in the first quarter year on year, with strong performance from Yves Saint Laurent and smaller brands having compensated for the cooling of Gucci’s growth.
The group’s turnover amounted to 4.96 billion euros for the quarter ended at the end of March, compared to 3.89 billion euros in the same period of 2020. At constant exchange rates and perimeter, sales increased increased by 21.4%.
According to a consensus established by FactSet, analysts expected an average turnover of 4.76 billion euros.
Worldwide sales of Yves Saint Laurent increased by 37% like-for-like, to 739 million euros, driven by “spectacular performances in Western Europe and North America”.
The leather goods manufacturer Bottega Veneta saw its sales increase by 16% on a like-for-like basis, to nearly 400 million euros, while the Kering Eyewear branch experienced a strong acceleration, with sales up 36% on a like-for-like basis, to 308 millions of euros.
Gucci, the group’s main division in terms of turnover and results, saw its organic growth slow to 13.4%, after 31.6% in the fourth quarter of 2021, due to the new confinements which have affected business in China in March. Analysts on average expected organic growth of 19.2% for the brand in the first quarter year on year.
Faced with this slowdown, Kering indicated that it was working to strengthen its teams on site in order to “capture all the dynamism of this market”. The brand’s turnover stood at 2.59 billion euros in the first quarter, against 2.17 billion euros a year earlier.
The group recently appointed Laurent Cathala, former president of the jeweler Tiffany in North Asia, as China director. “Beyond this announcement, we want to set up more powerful organizations in each of our major regions, with more premises in the teams”, underlined the financial director of Kering, Jean-Marc Duplaix, during a meeting. conference call.
“Our revenue growth in the first quarter is a testament to the strength of our set of brands,” he added.
-Francois Schott, Agefi-Dow Jones; 01 41 27 47 92; [email protected] ed: ECH
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April 21, 2022 11:48 ET (15:48 GMT)