Canadian Hudson’s Bay Company has seen its turnover grew a lot in 2016, mainly thanks to its acquisitions of German Galeria Kaufhof and Belgian Inno. However, it also suffered a huge loss last year.
Online surge
The company’s total turnover grew 29.5 % to 14.5 billion Canadian dollars (10.1 billion euro), mainly thanks to several purchases, because its like-for-like turnover dropped slightly, down 1.7 %. Five new Saks Fifth Avenue and 32 new Saks Off 5th stores also contributed 320 million dollars (223.5 million euro) to its turnover and its web shop Gilt acquisition also helped tremendously. According to the company, its like-for-like turnover drop was because of price pressure.
Thanks to the Gilt acquisition, Hudson’s Bay’s online growth was incredible, up 69.9 %. Excluding Gilt, the company still made strides online, growing its online turnover 16.6 %. Despite its higher turnover, there was still a huge loss. Where it managed a 387 million dollar (270 million euro) profit in 2015, it had to take a 516 million dollar (360 million euro) loss in 2016.
Invest in the Netherlands
In the next few years, Hudson’s Bay wants to cut 75 million dollars’ worth (52 million euro) of costs annually on top of lower investments, down 100 million dollars to 450 million dollars (315 million euro) for 2017 alone. To achieve its Dutch expansion, it will still set aside 100 million dollars (70 million euro), to prepare its first ten store openings in the Netherlands in August. It is still not clear which department stores will be among those first ten, but construction is moving according to plan, both in Amsterdam and in Leiden.
Hudson’s Bay wants to trial new innovations in the Netherlands. “We have the unique opportunity to start over new somewhere, something that has never been done in the world”, Richard Baker said. “We have garnered plenty of department store knowledge and we will implement our newest insights here.”
