Despite a drop in demand, knitwear retailer Speed Apparel Holding has managed to turn around a loss to a moderate amount of income attributable to its owners.

Its interim results for the year to the end of September show total revenue of about HK$197.2 million (US$25.2 million), down from $204.3 million the previous year.

Income attributable to the company’s owners was about $800,000, compared to last year’s loss of $900,000. Speed Apparel says that if non-recurring listing expenses of about $2 million were excluded (down from $6.5 million the previous year), the adjusted income attributable to the owners would have been about $2.8 million.

Sales of womenswear, amounting to about $155.2 million, accounted for about 78.7 per cent of the group’s total revenue. The group sold about 3.6 million units of knitwear with the sales volume for womenswear growing to about 3 million pieces, up from 2.9 million in the previous 12 months.

While revenue and profit had been affected by the drop in demand from existing customers, the sentiment of end consumers had improved in the global apparel retail market, says the company.

Despite the challenging trading environment, it tried to maintain the gross profit margin while maintaining supply-chain management for its customers.

Moving ahead, the group plans to add merchandising teams and strengthen its design team. It also plans a new office and showroom in Japan.

Based in Hong Kong, the group provides one-stop apparel supply-chain management services including fashion trend analysis, product design and development, sourcing and procurement of materials, production management, quality control and logistics services. Most of the group’s products are sold to Japan.