The French sporting goods retailing group is looking at store franchising and online sales as a less costly way to expand the presence of its Go Sport and Courir chains in its domestic market and as an alternative to Décathlon and Intersport, which have higher market shares in the country. Loïc Le Borgne, appointed as the new chief executive of Go Sport last July, is looking at a network of about 100 franchised Go Sport stores and 100 franchised Courir units in France by 2017. Go Sport launched e-commerce at the end of 2012, and Courir should follow in 2014.
Other than this, the new management is planning to make minimum investments in the renovation or expansion of its store network this year, after another big financial loss in 2012. Store franchising and the internet would supplement the present network of 176 Go Sport and 169 Courir stores in France and abroad. The first three Go Sport franchises in France opened last year, and the chain used franchising to open its first store in Egypt, but it also closed eight unprofitable stores in its domestic market. Go Sport and Courir have already adopted store franchising as a business model for its development outside France and Poland, where it already enjoys high market shares. There are now 32 Go Sport franchises and 12 Courir franchises abroad.
Last year, the group's net losses increased to €21.9 million from €20 million in the previous year, partly due to a higher debt load, but operating losses declined to €9.8 million from €12.1 million. In fact, its operating results improved by 28 percent before amortization in the second half of the year. The gross margin improved slightly for the year to 41.1 percent from 40.0 percent the year before.
As already reported, the group's turnover declined by 1 percent to €675.6 million for the year, but it rose by nearly 1 percent overall on a same-store basis. Also on a comparable basis, the multi-sport Go Sport stores in France suffered a sales decline of 0.6 percent, but Courir, the group's athletic footwear chain, experienced an increase of 3.2 percent and the Polish Go Sport stores enjoyed an increase of more than 5 percent.
Go Sport has been doing well in France with recently introduced brands such as The North face, Under Armour and the lifestyle collections of Le Coq Sportif. The restyled and expanded Go Sport in the shopping center at La Défénse near Paris has been enjoying double-digit growth. The Polish stores benefited from special promotions for international brands, especially during the Euro 2012 football championships, and the strong development of their loyalty program.
