Rip Curl, despite a “challenging consumer environment,” has generated positive year-over-year, single-digit sales growth in the direct-to-consumer channel in Europe and the US ahead of the peak weeks during the summer season. The brand’s wholesale customers, meanwhile, continue to reduce their inventory levels. Parent KMD Brands said Rip Curl’s global sales trends for the first four months of its H2 have shown year-over-year improvement.
However, the New Zealand group has not experienced the ongoing improvement it had forecast for its Kathmandu business in the southern hemisphere’s key winter trading period. With six weeks left before the end of its fiscal year on July 31, KMD has adjusted its full-year Ebitda outlook to approximately NZ$50 million (€28.6m). The group’s aggregate H1 sales fell by 14.5 percent while sales for the first three months of H2 were down by 8.4 percent.
A deeper dive into the company’s H2 year-over-year sales performance through May 31 showed a 21.8 percent decline at Oboz, an 8.4 percent drop at Kathmandu and a 5.9 percent decline for Rip Curl. The company’s Kathmandu segment has experienced a slow start to the key winter promotional period with overall sales through three weeks down by 11.5 percent. Meanwhile, Oboz sales for the 10 months ended May 31 were up 29 percent year-over-year, benefitting from strategic promotional activity and new product innovations.
“With six weeks of peak trade still to come, we remain focused on optimising our Kathmandu winter and Rip Curl Northern Hemisphere summer results in a challenging consumer environment,” commented Group CEO and Managing Director, Michael Daly. “We are seeing a prolonged impact of cost-of-living pressures on consumer sentiment globally but particularly in New Zealand, and we continue to respond tactically to competitive market dynamics.”
KMD Brands is scheduled to formally report its full-year results in September.
