Movado Group’s Online Retail Growth Leads to 15.5% Net Sales Increase

Luxury is going online, at least for Movado Group in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2022, as the company called out growth in online retail as one of the driving factors in its quarterly net sales increase of 15.5% for the three-month period that ended Jan. 31.

Overall, net sales were up from $178.3 million in Q4 of FY21 to $206 million in FY22’s final three months, according to the company’s earnings report released Thursday (March 24). Movado also saw growth in its wholesale brick-and-mortar sales and at Movado stores to create the sizeable year-to-year jump.

In the U.S., net sales increased 18.5% compared to the fourth quarter of last year and 12.3% from Q4 of fiscal 2020. International net sales in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2022, meanwhile, were up 12.7% from fiscal 2021 and 3.8% from FY20.

For the full fiscal 2022, net sales reached $732.4 million.

“We closed out the year with exceptional fourth quarter performance, resulting in record annual net sales of $732.4 million and operating profit margin of 16.0%,” Movado Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Efraim Grinberg said in the company press release. “We attribute our ongoing strength to the successful execution of our strategy with powerful brands, excellent craftsmanship and desirable designs.

“This drove sales growth in our owned and licensed brands; in the U.S. and internationally; and across our channels of wholesale and direct-to-consumer. We continued our digital advancement, reporting significant growth on our Movado.com site, which we believe is a testament to our keen focus and further development of our digital platform and omni-channel capabilities,” he said.

Movado — like all retailers — faces what Grinberg calls “an uncertain environment, with rising interest rates heightened by increasing inflation, combined with the war in Ukraine, on-going COVID outbreaks and closures in China, and lapping U.S. stimulus measures in the first half of last year, yet we remain confident in our positioning and our ability to deliver long term growth in sales and profit.

“We have a deep pipeline of product innovation and recently added another iconic licensed brand to our portfolio with the launch of CALVIN KLEIN, which is experiencing strong consumer response,” he said.

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