Latest Headlines – Page 187
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Salmoiraghi Improves Sales And Margins
Salmoiraghi & Viganò, the leading Italian optical retailer controlled by Dino Tabacchi, is eyeing new acquisitions after reaching a total of 249 points of sale at the end of March, up from 233 six months earlier, including 47 discount stores trading under the Vistasi banner and 50 franchised stores. The ...
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The German Market Fell By 31% In 2004, But There Were More Stores In Operation
The number of optical retail outlets continued to increase in Germany last year in spite of the elimination of the German government's subsidies for eyewear, which led the country's optical retailers to book a 31 percent decrease in their sales to €3,064 million, according to their trade association, ZVA. The ...
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Fielmann Recovers Strongly From The Health Reform
Germany's leading optical retailer, reports a 33 percent increase in new customers' orders at its stores during the 1st quarter in terms of units, with a 37 percent increase in April. While the feat may be partly the result of a special new insurance policy generalized by Fielmann throughout the ...
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Essilor Performs Well In Spite Of Poor European Sales In The Quarter
A 1.5 percent drop in European sales to €269.1 million dragged down the growth in Essilor's sales during the 1st quarter. Thanks to improvements in the USA and in all the other markets, the total turnover rose by 2.3 percent to €570.0 million from the same period a year ago, ...
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Hoya Vision Loses Steam
Sales in the vision care segment of Hoya Corp. rose by only 0.3 percent to 24.5 billion yen (€179m-$231.1m) in the 4th quarter of its financial year, ended March 31, and they generated an operating margin of 17.2 percent, down from 21.3 percent in the same period a year ago. ...
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Rodenstock Acquires Danish Market Leader
Rodenstock has bought out J.C. Filtenborg A/S, described as market leader in Denmark in the area of ophthalmic optics, with a market share of just under 30 percent. Giancarlo Galli, CEO of the German company, says this is the first step in an international expansion strategy that calls for organic ...
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De Rigo Improves Margins
Income from operations (Ebit) grew at De Rigo by 15.7 percent to €28.8 million in 2004, representing 5.6 percent of net sales, as compared to 4.9 percent the year before. Net income totalled €14.5 million, down 21.6 percent from the previous year, when earnings were boosted by a gain on ...
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Marcolin Will Develop A Tom Ford Line
Marcolin's stock market valuation increased by a further 16.9 percent immediately after the announcement of a new licensing deal for an eyewear collection named after Tom Ford, the former creative director of Gucci Group, who has formed a partnership with its former CEO, Domenico De Sole, to build up a ...
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Oakley Is Sustained By Many Factors
Oakley's net income jumped by 74.2 percent to $7,355,000 in the 1st quarter as its total sales rose by 10.2 percent to $141.8 million. New categories generated 16.1 percent higher sales of $60.6 million, driven by the new Thump, which is going to be distributed now also in Sunglass Hut ...
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Sauflon Starts Up A New Plant In The Uk And Looks At External Growth
The British company is pursuing an acquisition strategy to help cope with rising competition from the contact lens majors. Sauflon is currently looking at a couple of prospective takeovers, but the management declines to elaborate. Following a multi-million-pound investment, Sauflon has opened a new manufacturing site in Fareham, ...
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Fielmann Raises Its Market Share Further
Preliminary figures show that Germany's largest optical retailer consolidated its leadership in the domestic market, raising its market share to 53 percent in terms of volume. While sales and profits declined, they came out higher than in 2002, the last ?normal? year that was not influenced by the last big ...
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Essilor Posts A Record Ebit Margin And Looks Outside Europe To Drive Growth
Essilor's operating income (Ebit) rose by 10.7 percent to €403.9 million, boosting the operating margin to a record level of 17.9 percent, as compared to 17.2 percent in 2003, and the results would have improved more if the euro had not been so strong. Ebit would have risen by 20.7 ...
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Carl Zeiss Vision Is Born
Carl Zeiss Vision is the name of the new company resulting from the merger of Carl Zeiss' vision care operations and SOLA International. It will be run by Jeremy C. Bishop, the British executive who has been SOLA's CEO, based in California, since April 2000. Based at Aalen in Germany, ...
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Shamir Has Gone Public
Shamir Optical Industry, the Israeli company specializing in progressive lenses, went public on the NASDAQ stock exchange in New York last March 11. From the initial offer price of $14.00 a share, the stock has gone up to as much as $19 a share. It's currently trading at just over ...
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Safilo Improves Results And Looks To The Stock Market Again
Safilo is contemplating a possible return to the stock exchange in 2006, if market conditions are right. The closure of its production facilities in Austria and tight cost controls allowed the company to improve its profitability last year and to reduce its debt to €758 million from the level of ...
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Marcolin Improves Results, But Contemplates Temporary Layoffs
Marcolin's board of directors has approved a contingency plan intended to cut costs in view of the loss of the juicy Dolce & Gabbana licenses at the end of this year. The plan involves the possibility to place about 180 employees on temporary layoffs. This will depend on the order ...
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Italy's Trade Balance In Eyewear Declines, And So Does Employment
Recording a small recovery, Italy's eyewear exports increased by 1.3 percent in the first nine months of 2004 to €1,170 million, according to ANFAO, the country's optical industry association, while imports grew by 6.5 percent, to a level that was not spelled out in its statement. Exports of sunglasses rose ...
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Layoffs Also In France
The country's largest manufacturer of spectacle frames, L'Amy, has announced a plan to shut down two of its three factories in the Jura region of France, involving the elimination of 170 jobs. The group will keep 223 employees in France, of whom 168 will be working at its main site ...
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The French Market Grew By 3.5% In 2004
Figures published by the GfK market research agency show a 3.5 percent increase in value for the French market in 2004 to €3.5 billion. Sales of prescription lenses rose by 3.1 percent in volume to over 23 million units and by 3.8 percent in value to more than €2 billion, ...
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Optic 2000 Raises Sales Faster
Both of two major French buying groups in the optical sector raised their market shares in 2004, judging from the figures that they have released over the past few weeks. The retail outlets affiliated with one of the two, Gadol Optic 2000, raised their sales by 6 percent on a ...
