‘Athleisure’ continues to eat into Stella International’s fashion shoe business
20/03/2017
In terms of volume, Stella sold 52.9 million pairs of shoes last year, 9.1% down year on year.
On releasing the results, Stella said the lower figures for value and volume in 2016 were “mostly attributed to the continued weakness in non-sports footwear products”. Group factories dedicated to making non-athletic footwear functioned at levels much lower than full capacity, it added, especially during the first half of 2016.
Chief executive, Lawrence Chen, explained on announcing the results that global political events and changing consumer tastes both had an impact on Stella’s performance last year. “Our ability to cope with these changes stabilised towards the end of the year, which helped us to reduce inefficiencies and the under-utilisation of some of our factories,” he said.
Fashion footwear contributed 42% of total revenue in 2016, compared to 46% in 2015. Casual footwear’s contribution also fell, to 29% last year copmared to 32.5% the year before. Stella said ‘athleisure’ remains an important driver for growth. Last year, sales of shoes in this category accounted for 24% of revenues, whereas the corresponding figure in 2015 was 16.9%.
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