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Celio Plans To Open 10 New Stores In Spain In 2015

20 February 2015 – Modaes

The French menswear company Celio is looking for new opportunities in the Spanish market with a clear message from the group’s head office: generate profitability. The company, which closed 2014 with sixty stores in Spain, has set an overall goal of generating profits in all of the countries in which it has a presence. In the context of the chain’s development in Spain, Celio will open ten new stores this year, mainly using the franchise formula; it is also looking for new opportunities in Madrid and Barcelona, where it wants to open two flagship stores before the end of 2015.

Celio was created in France in 1982 by the siblings Marc and Lauren Grossmen; the pair also own the womenswear chain Jennyfer. The company, which currently has a distribution network of more than 1,200 stores across 65 countries, opened its first outlets in Spain in 1985, although it was not until the year 2000 when the company created a subsidiary in the country, led by Abel Núñez, from Adolfo Domínguez.

The Spanish branch of Celio, which has a distribution network comprising 60 stores in Spain, closed 2014 (on 31 January 2015) with sales of €42.7 million, an increase of 4.2% on the previous year.

“The message from head office is that the mantra for the global business is: generate profitability in all of its stores”, explains Antonio Pirruccio, Head of Expansion at Celio in Spain. “To achieve this, we have hired a new Head of Stores for the Spanish subsidiary, who will be in charge of budgets, analysis and sales forecasts by product family for Celio’s stores in Spain”.

Celio, which recently appointed Guillaume Motte, from Jennyfer, as the new Chairman of the group, says that Spain is its third largest market in terms of turnover. “This year we have increased our contribution to total revenues, so we can see that the chain is working well in this market” adds Pirruccio.

Last year, the company launched a new strategy for the Spanish market, focused on the opening of flagship stores on the country’s main (high) streets. The chain opened a store on Gran Vía in Bilbao last June, in premises that previously housed the womenswear chain Blanco and has a retail surface area of 300 square metres.

Celio has also launched a process to search for premises to open flagship stores on Gran Vía, in Madrid, on Paseo de Gracia or in Portal de l’Angel in Barcelona, and in the south of Spain, where Celio is considering opening stores in Malaga and Sevilla.

“Another goal at the group level is the reorganisation of Celio’s portfolio of stores in all of its countries (of operation), which is why we are currently renegotiating rents and relocating shops that are not profitable”, explains Pirruccio. Celio plans to open ten stores in Spain, of which at least eight will be franchises.

Original story: Modaes

Translation: Carmel Drake