China Strategy For Old Buddha'S Department Store: 8 Stores Outside Shanghai, Beijing

The Shanghai flagship store, which has a total business area of over 25 thousand square meters, officially opened in Lujiazui, Pudong, L+Mall, and launched the fashion Carnival experience activity "Let 's Celebrate Fashion". At the same time, Lafayette department stores also launched the first 72 hour online shop Limited WeChat Mini program "Lafayette department store Limited shop".

At the opening ceremony, Nicolas Houz Houz, chief executive officer of Galeries Lafayette, France's high-end department store, revealed that in the future, the Department will further expand the Chinese market and plan to open 8 more stores in China by 2025. Nicolas Houz e said: "it took us 6 years to open second stores in China, and we will accelerate the pace of opening third stores." However, Houz did not mention the next city to be stationed in.

He said: "Lord Buddha is an attractive department store brand. There are many cities and authorities in China that want us to enter, but we must be very careful to find the best business location." This limited time WeChat Mini program will help the Department of Lafayette to further understand which areas have the most commercial potential to a certain extent.

However, at the end of 3 this year, Nicolas Houz said in his exclusive interview with "gorgeous ambition": "the first tier cities are not the only choice. At present, Beijing stores 47 thousand square meters and Shanghai stores 25 thousand square meters. In the future, they may choose smaller shops with a relatively small area, which may be between 1~5 square meters."

　　 As a world-famous department store brand, Lafayette department store has been established for more than 120 years since its inception. There are 67 stores, of which 59 are in France. The other 8 are located in Beijing, Shanghai, Doha, Dubai, Berlin, Istanbul, Beirut and Jakarta. In addition, the Luxemburg store will be opened in November this year, and the Milan store will open before 2022.

According to public information, in the 2018 fiscal year, the net sales of old lord's department store was 4 billion 500 million euros, of which the international market accounted for 10%, and the Chinese market share was not disclosed. But according to Philippe Pedone, vice president of Department of international trade at the Department of Lafayette, it is estimated that by 2025, China will become the most important overseas market of Lafayette department store. The annual sales volume of China's market will account for 15% of the total sales of the group and is expected to exceed 1 billion euros.

As early as 1998, Lafayette department stores opened the first Chinese store on the Donghua Gate Street in Wangfujing, Beijing. However, by 1999, due to poor management and poor sales performance, Wangfujing shop of Lafayette department store closed only a year ago.

In 2013, through the cooperation with I.T fashion group in Hongkong, Lafayette department store established a 50:50 joint venture, Lafayette department store (China), once again entered Beijing and settled in Beijing Xidan.

The flagship store in Shanghai is still established by I.T and Hongkong fashion group. The scale of the specific investment has not yet been disclosed, but the opening funds of the flagship store in Shanghai all come from the revenue of Beijing stores.

　　 Multi brand

The flagship store of Shanghai is located in Pudong Lujiazui L+Mall business district. For this location, Philippe Pedone, senior vice president of international business at Lafayette department store, said in an interview with "ornate ambition" that the decisive factor is that the forward fashion atmosphere of the business circle touched them deeply.

Philippe Pedone explains that L+Mall is located at the junction of Shanghai Metro Line 2 and line 9, covering 600 thousand people and workers. There are a large number of millennial consumers who have a good educational background, keen to travel abroad, and are very interested in fashion trends. He stressed: "fashion is not exclusive to luxury goods."

In addition, from the perspective of brand positioning, the Shanghai flagship store of Lafayette department takes into consideration the brand of different pricing ranks of light luxury, high-end and heavy luxury, and realizes the diversification of brand portfolio. Each shop has a selected multi brand area EDIT, which combines French, Chinese and international brands. These brands include not only famous brands but also some cutting-edge niche designers.

In terms of Chinese brands, Angel Chen (Chen Anqi), Yang Li (Li Yang) and other Chinese designer brands have been introduced into Lafayette department store.

Creative space

The overall design of the flagship store of Lafayette department store was designed by HMKM, a famous London Design Studio, and inspired by the flagship store in Paris, Shanghai, but new elements were added to the interior design of Osman. The centre of the shop will exhibit the OPPLE art work Danse d 'Ellipses, designed by the famous artist Felice Varini. The greenery landscape platform in atrium originates from terraced fields with Asian characteristics.

At the same time, CEO Nicolas Houz also emphasized that the department stores are not only the destination of people shopping, but also combine the creative space of retail, fashion, design and art. In the future, Shanghai flagship store will also organize regular activities to enhance interaction with consumers, such as fashion show or KOL meeting.