Luxury fashion retailer Moiselle has revealed a raft of innovative strategies to restore flagging sales – including flying big-spending Singaporean customers to its Hong Kong stores.
Hit by a HK$31.9 million (S$5.766 million) loss for the first half of the trading year due to declining spending by Mainland Chinese tourists, Moiselle is introducing new ranges and even flying in loyal customers for exclusive product displays.
The company has reigned in its store openings and is putting the squeeze on landlords to reduce rents.
Last week Moiselle revealed its sales had fallen by 21 per cent to $161.2 million mainly due to weak consumer sentiment and sluggish retail sales in its Hong Kong home market, which accounts for 55 per cent of its turnover. Gross margin fell from 82 per cent in the first half of last year to 76 per cent in the latest period.
Moiselle Singapore, which has four stores, posted a solid 54 per cent increase in sales, bucking the trend of its other markets. Sales here totalled S$955,000.
Across all of its markets, the group operated 92 retail stores and counters in Hong Kong; first- and second-tier cities of China; Macau, Taiwan and Singapore as at September 30 – three fewer than at the end of March.
Moiselle – which sells through two Moiselle and two Germain stores in Singapore – has shifted focus to a more tailor-made sales model in Hong Kong which targets members of its VIP customer club and formed with several Mainland Chinese online shopping website operators.
The organised shopping visits by customers from Mainland China, Taiwan and Singapore to its product showrooms in Hong Kong, targeting the loyal customers with high spending power. The tours began in May and started generating income in July.
Meanwhile, it forged ahead with a strategy of diversifying its product offer to target different segments of the high-end and upper middle markets for women’s fashion apparel and accessories. Moiselle expanded its Moiselle and Germain ranges into menswear. It launched European accessories labels Sequoia and Coccinelle into the apparel market through exclusive distribution agreements to add impetus to its business development.
In its stock exchange filing, Moiselle said it did not expect Hong Kong’s retail market to turn around “any time soon”.
