Noble birds fold their wings, rich birds go bankrupt, shoe king Belle is reborn, and this crisis that spreads in the shoe industry is still not over!
On April 15, Daphne International released its 2019 financial report, which showed that in 2019, the company achieved revenue of HK$2.126 billion, a year-on-year decrease of 48%; gross profit of HK$781 million, a year-on-year decrease of 62%; and operating loss of HK$1.02 billion, an increase of 30% year-on-year.
Flipping through Daphne's earnings report, we find that this year has been the 7th consecutive year of decline in revenue. Behind the bad report card is the best portrayal of Daphne's transformation and failure.
A generation of shoe kings to today, the industry cycle problem is a problem that can not be ignored. Of course, the problem of self is the most important factor.
Pulling the long-term axis, we will find that whether it is ANTA, Li Ning or Noble Bird, or Metersbonwe or Urban Beauty, their glory is around 2014, which is the peak of the industry.
The swarming listings are accompanied by intensive store openings.
The number of stores in the year before the listing reached more than 7,000, and the shoe king Daphne also had 6,757 stores at its peak. The era of winning by quantity soon became history, and under the impact of e-commerce, the clothing industry and the footwear industry began to move towards a cold winter.
Since 2014, the intensive wave of store closures has swept the entire industry, but the "shoe king" and clothing leader in the center of the storm are still in hindsight, typical of the noble bird, after the listing, it is not only not conducive to capital advantages to create an online platform, but also began blind diversification.
The decline of the industry will not end in a year!
Apparently, they collectively underestimated the length of the winter, and during the long winter of boiling frogs in warm water, they began to close one shop after another and break their arms to survive.
According to statistics, from 2015 to 2019, the number of Daphne stores closed 827, 1030, 1064, 941 and 2395 stores respectively.
In five years, Daphne closed 6,257 stores, with a closing rate of more than 90%. Today, Daphne has fewer than 500 stores left.
With 500 stores corresponding to a market value of HK$200 million, Daphne, which once had a market value of HK$18.9 billion, will never return to the peak! This is not the reason for the Daphne family, it is relatively lucky compared to the rich bird, at least it is not dead.
Of course, what caused Daphne's current situation was not a day's work. As early as 2009, Daphne also had the choice of e-commerce. At that time, it co-invested with Baidu in the e-commerce platform "Yaodian 100", and in order to fully support this platform, Daphne closed multiple distribution channels such as JD.com and Letao.
The style of concentrating on big things did not allow Daphne to get the results she wanted, and the decisive approach cut off all of Daphne's retreats, and after three years of trial and error, on July 28, 2012, "Yaodian 100" collapsed due to the break of the capital chain, and Daphne's e-commerce dream was completely shattered.
This failure is not only the failure of Daphne's e-commerce road, but also the beginning of a twist in its fate.
Since 2012, Daphne's revenue has declined continuously, and its net profit has been a continuous loss. Especially in recent years, Daphne has come to the brink of collapse.
Founded in 1987, Daphne has been sitting in the chair of the most leading brand in the mainland for 5 consecutive years, with a market share of up to 20%, and is a well-deserved "shoe king". Today, its past glory can only be recreated in corporate history.
In fact, it has tried too. After the failure of e-commerce, Daphne has also pushed through the transformation, from channels, business models to stores, product images, in the past few years Daphne has been adjusting and struggling, but unfortunately the results are minimal.
In its 2019 strategy, "asset-light" is the last card it can play, and in 2019 Daphne closed 2395 stores, not only that, but it also cleaned up its seasonal inventory in large quantities. According to the financial report, Daphne's inventory level decreased by 84% from HK$992 million in 2018 to HK$162 million at the end of 2019, with the average inventory turnover days decreasing by 41 days to 157 days year-on-year.
In terms of sales channels, in 2019, Daphne changed her previous thinking of reducing the proportion of franchisees and decided to convert most of the directly operated stores into a partnership system or franchise system. At the same time, it also continues to promote the layout of new image stores in shopping malls to enhance the brand image.
However, all this effort did not achieve the desired purpose, and Daphne's loss margin last year has widened.
Today, Daphne can't stand the toss.
In less than a decade, its market value has plummeted by 99%, and now it has to face not whether it can return to the top, but the problem of life and death.