Puma’s supplier partnerships ‘indispensable’ as it navigates pandemic
Puma has said its relationship with suppliers, disciplined buying and good inventory management were among strategies that helped it report a 9% currency adjusted (ca) growth in sales in the fourth quarter, and flat sales for the full year 2020 compared with the year before.
It reached revenues of €1.5 billion for the fourth quarter and €5.2 billion for the year.
During 2020, sales in footwear were down by 3.1% (ca) and in apparel by 1.5%, while sales in accessories grew by 3.5%.
Puma CEO Bjørn Gulden said 2020 was the most difficult year. “I am very happy that we managed to end a very difficult 2020 with – considering the circumstances - a good fourth quarter. We grew our sales in the fourth quarter, despite lockdown measures, by 9% to € 1,520 million and our EBIT by 15% to € 63 million.
"This, together with our strong performance in the third quarter, where our sales grew 13%, underlines the strength of both PUMA and the whole sports industry, and makes me look positively to the future. We see that people around the world want to do more sports as soon as restrictions allow them to and we see that consumers have continued to buy new sneakers and sportswear also during the pandemic.”
Puma focused on six existing strategic priorities: create “brand heat”; design, develop and produce “market-leading” product ranges; build a comprehensive offer for women; improve the quality of distribution; increase the speed and efficiency of organisational infrastructure; and strengthen the North American market by leveraging the re-entry into the basketball category. It added two further strategic priorities: a stronger focus on local relevance and increased communication around sustainability.
As stores closed and orders dropped at the start of the pandemic, it cancelled less than 1% of orders and paid the suppliers’ costs. It said the long-term collaboration with suppliers proved to be indispensable “and will continue to be a key component of the strategy”.
Puma invested in logistics and IT and added partners like footballer Neymar Jr and singer Dua Lipa.
The negative impact of the pandemic is expected to have an effect until the second half of the year. “I am convinced that 2021 will be a better year for us than 2020,” added Mr Gulden.
