Britain’s high street may be soggy but high-end trenchcoat maker Burberry is not. The eurozone can melt down, China can slow and rain can fall, but the luxury goods company is as impermeable as its wet-weather gear. Yesterday Burberry reported that revenues and profits before tax for the year to March had both risen by about a quarter. Operating margins widened 80 basis points to 16.4 per cent as brand-conscious customers in the Asia-Pacific region (making up nearly two-fifths of sales) donned its apparel or carried its bags. Burberry’s shift from wholesaler to retailer under chief executive Angela Ahrendts has paid off too: more than two-thirds of sales now come from retail versus two-fifths when she arrived in 2006. Its market capitalisation has even overtaken that of Marks and Spencer, the UK high street store chain.
英国商业街上的气氛或许有些沉闷，但高端风衣生产商博柏利(Burberry)的情况完全不同。欧元区可能解体，manbetx3.0 manbetx20客户端下载 增长可能放缓，天可能下雨，但这家奢侈品企业就像它生产的风衣一样不惧风雨。周三，博柏利发布财报称，它在截至3月底的这个财年的税前收入和税前利润均增长了约四分之一。由于亚太地区具有品牌意识的顾客（占销售额的近五分之二）纷纷穿上博柏利的服装或拎上它的手袋，其营业利润率增加了80个基点，至16.4%。在首席执行官安吉拉•阿伦茨(Angela Ahrendts)带领下，博柏利从批发商转型为零售商，此举也带来了回报：阿伦茨在2006年就职时零售业务占博柏利销售额的五分之二，现在则占了三分之二以上。博柏利的市值甚至已超过英国商业街上的连锁商店玛莎百货(Marks and Spencer)。