Forus reported to the Financial Market Commission (CMF) its highest first-quarter earnings since 2017. The company posted "a new record in sales" and earnings of more than CLP$ 6 billion, exceeding by more than 75% the performance of the same period last year.
Revenue, meanwhile, soared above CLP$ 77 billion between January and March, growing by 10.4% YoY.
This, said the company linked to the Swett family, is "explained by Chile, which recorded an increase of 7.8%, and the subsidiaries, which, as a whole, increased by 20.9%".
The results are also due to the “various measures that we have been implementing to contain expenses, improve efficiencies and increase productivity, including the closure of underperforming stores, remodeling stores, digitalization and automation operations and streamlining technology solutions at our subsidiaries,” Forus wrote in its earnings release.
In the report submitted to the regulator, the representative in Chile of brands such as Columbia, Hush Puppies, CAT and RKF reviewed the scenario facing the current retail industry. "In Chile, although this quarter we faced a slowdown in consumption and high inventory levels in the industry, we achieved record sales," he said. This situation, the report added, was driven by sales in the direct-to-consumer (DTC) and wholesale segments. As for the former, which grew by 8.1%, Forus referred to the "robust performance of the stores" and revealed that sales per square meter increased by 34%, highlighting the role of the closure of unprofitable stores.