The Business of Fashion
Agenda-setting intelligence, analysis and advice for the global fashion community.
Agenda-setting intelligence, analysis and advice for the global fashion community.
Sales at the 31-year-old South Korean retailer’s luxury outpost in Seoul’s Apgujeong neighbourhood reached 1 trillion won (around $844 million) for the first time, The Korea Times reports.
Galleria, which was South Korea’s first luxury goods retailer and helped Louis Vuitton and Hermès open their first local boutiques, shifted its focus to luxury goods over the pandemic. By the end of November, its sales had grown 31 percent year-on-year, with revenues from luxury goods generally up 49 percent, and luxury jewellery and watches up 67 percent.
Sales from VIP customers, which make up more than 40 percent of Galleria’s luxury goods sales, were up 49 percent from 2020. The company attributes this growth partially to the introduction of arts and lifestyle experiences, including art sales, to its outpost.
Luxury leather goods, jewellery and watches made $12.5 billion in sales in the country last year — roughly in line with the previous year, according
Local streetwear brands, festivals and stores selling major global labels remain relatively small but the country’s community of hypebeasts and sneakerheads is growing fast.
This week’s round-up of global markets fashion business news also features Senegalese investors, an Indian menswear giant and workers’ rights in Myanmar.
Though e-commerce reshaped retailing in the US and Europe even before the pandemic, a confluence of economic, financial and logistical circumstances kept the South American nation insulated from the trend until later.
This week’s round-up of global markets fashion business news also features Korean shopping app Ably, Kenya’s second-hand clothing trade and the EU’s bid to curb forced labour in Chinese cotton.