Van de Velde sees positives despite Covid hit

Belgian lingerie group Van de Velde has been hit hard by the Covid pandemic, and several stores in the United States will not open again. Still, the group sees hopeful signs and has therefore decided to pay out a dividend after all.

Cutting costs and selling online

Just as most of its colleagues in the fashion sector, Van de Velde’s half-year results took a bad hit in the past Covid-filled months. The Belgian lingerie company saw its turnover drop by a quarter to 74 million euros. Sales in its own stores went down 42 %, but in the United States that drop was as high as 60 %. CEO Marleen Vaesen is considering closing a number of stores for good, she told Belgian business newspaper De Tijd.

In wholesale, the turnover drop was 23.5 %, as online partners like Zalando played a major role in compensating losses. However, the CEO was also vocal in thanking independent store-owners, who were “digitally creative” during the lockdowns. Despite the market for lingerie dropping to “almost zero” during and shortly after the lockdowns, Vaesen has the impression that most stores will survive this crisis.

Van de Velde’s net profit dropped 60 % to 5 million euros, but it remained above zero – as opposed to many other fashion companies. Its EBITDA dropped 31 % to 16.3 million euros, but the group succeeded in cutting costs by 4.4 million euros – partly thanks to government schemes like temporary unemployment to limit job losses.

The CEO did not want to comment on expectations for the rest of the year, but her company has decided it sees enough positive signs to pay out a dividend after all – despite its earlier decision to suspend these for this year.