Good evening. This is the Chorus Call Conference operator. Welcome. Thank you for joining the Moncler first half 2023 financial results conference call. As a reminder, all participants are in listen-only mode. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Should anyone need assistance during the conference call, they may signal an operator by pressing star zero on their telephone. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Ms. Elena Mariani, Strategic Planning and Investor Relations Director of Moncler. Please go ahead, madam.
Good evening, everybody, and thank you for joining our call today, on Moncler Group's first half 2023 financial results. As usual, let me introduce you to the speakers of today's call, Mr. Remo Ruffini, Moncler Group's Chairman and CEO, Roberto Eggs, Chief Business Strategy and Global Market Officer, Gino Fisanotti, Moncler Chief Brand Officer, Luciano Santel, Chief Corporate and Supply Officer. Before starting, I need to remind you that this presentation may contain certain statements that are neither reported financial results nor other historical information. Any forward-looking statements are based on group current expectations and projections about future events. By their nature, forward-looking statements are subject to risks, uncertainties, and other factors that could cause results to differ even materially from those expressed in or implied by these statements, many of which are beyond the ability of the group to control or estimate.
Finally, I remind you that the press has been invited to participate to this conference in a listen-only mode. Let me now hand over to our Chairman and CEO, Mr. Remo Ruffini.
Good evening, everyone, thank you for joining the Moncler Group first half results conference call. I'm very proud to say that for the first time in our history, our revenues in the first half of the years exceeded EUR 1 billion. This is a remarkable milestone, achieved thanks to the contributor of all our teams, with our energy, our creativity, and our hard work. The first six months of the year, group sales rose by 24% at contrast currencies and accelerated in Q2, thanks to the DTC channel, which remain at the core of our strategy. Looking at our operating performance, first half, EBIT reached EUR 218 million, with an operating margin above 19%, and we have delivered a solid performance in all economics and financial metrics.
I see a future with a lot of opportunity for both our brands. At Moncler, we are delivering on our promise to develop all the three dimension of our brand, a strategy that already help us to grow about 30% in the first part of the year. I see a great potential for Moncler Grenoble. The first full spring-summer collection was particularly well received and prove that Grenoble is becoming relevant all year round. Moncler Genius start a new chapter in February as a co-creation platform. With Genius, we are always looking for new ways to engage with our communities, especially the younger generation. We keep investing also in our main collection. This year we have successfully launched our first ever formal summer campaign. Gino will talk more about it.
At Stone Island, Carlo and I are excited for the start of the second phase of evolution under Robert Triefus, that just arrived. We are working to increase the relevance of the brand worldwide, always remaining connected to its unique history and DNA. We are enforcing our team, and we have added new talent, particularly in the marketing and the data area. It will be a journey. As you know, in our group, we always try to do the right thing at the right time, with no shortcut. As a group, we operate in a very dynamic, fast-evolving, and sometimes complex environment. What is sure is that we will continue to execute our brand-first strategy and invest in our organization, in our people, to enable our brands to express their full potential. Let me now leave the floor to Gino, Roberto, and Luciano for more comment and results.
Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Ruffini, and hello, good afternoon, good morning to everyone during the call. I think as Mr. Ruffini mentioned, this wasn't just another quarter for us, it was a special one. If we start talking about Grenoble, as we mentioned, this was the first time that we were able to put in place our all-year-round strategy. This is the first time we start the year with the beginning of spring/summer 2023, which, as we mentioned, was very well received in this idea of having more lightweight systems and layering system into the product. Of course, just before the end of the quarter, we present for first time our pre-fall Moncler Grenoble collection.
Again, as an early full launch, we've seen an incredible way to not only engage with customers, but the collection have been extremely well received. If we move on into the second dimension of the brand, as we discussed, regarding Genius, we of course, we see a lot of good momentum on this on the back of the event that happened in London at the end of February.
I think on the back of that, we were able to launch successfully two collections during this Q2. The first one was regarding Alicia Keys at the very end of March, something that performed well and was particularly for us, very well received in Asia as well across both men and women, despite that the story and the whole collection was inspired in the '90s, in New York, we've seen a good reception for this in the Asian markets. Of course, the second launch was a little bit more than 45 days ago, regarding the Fragment collection with Moncler Genius. We have the opportunity to introduce a narrative around love is human, something that we started in the London event in February.
I think in this case, we're able to even work and have the opportunity to have a Korean celebrity inside the campaign who was able to help us to drive an incredible engagement, especially when we talk about social media, both in Western, in the Western world and in the Asian platforms around the globe. Really good momentum on the back of Genius and the efforts that the team have been putting since the beginning of the year. If we mention the third dimension of the brand, I think Mr. Ruffini just comment about this. I think we are happy to see our efforts in terms of leveraging the momentum of the brand way beyond winter.
I think what we have seen on the main collection and the orchestration of our efforts regarding summer is the appetite and the desire of customers for our brand, just way beyond winter. I think what we've seen is an opportunity of how customers are adopting different classifications beyond our jackets, not only on lightweight propositions, but even into some of other classifications like cut and sew or even beachwear and more that was presented. I think the reception of the campaign was strong, not only just in terms of customers, but we've seen a good take from media, even from the organic point that started talking about how Moncler is moving way beyond winter.
With that in mind, I think, we always want to make sure that we give a clear update regarding the three dimensions of the brand that we are focusing all our efforts again. If we move to the next slide and more into the digital side, I think, again, a bit more good news here. I think as we discussed multiple time, it's not just about the good momentum we can see on the revenue side, but it's more about how we can leverage digital platforms to truly engage customers in a different and in a more deeper way.
This is why we're seeing good results across what we call Moncler members, which are customers that are logging with us, that we are able to follow up in a more one-to-one relationship and have a more effective way to connect with them. Same thing regarding the traffic. More importantly for us, is about when we look at PDP or product views, which is the real interest from customers regarding our product. One thing to mention regarding traffic, I think it's important to keep calling out that a good way to look at the health of the brand is looking at how much of that traffic is not only paid traffic, but it's even organic traffic in terms of looking for the brand and finding the com as a clear destination. A few other call-outs.
I think, as I mentioned before, really strong performance on the social side, especially compared to last year. Of course, the intensity of the work that the team is putting together, having been doubling down and paying off in terms of what we are seeing in terms of results across the board. Last but not least, I think, the team is starting to put extra emphasis, not only in terms of the com and the traffic, but I think in terms of the performance of certain items like newsletter, paid media, et cetera, that is, of course, helping us to have a very efficient way to drive our business. With that overview, I will let Roberto continue to give you a bit more information and details about the quarter.
Thank you, Gino. Good afternoon to everybody. I'm happy to drive you through the result by geography and by channels for both Moncler and Stone Island. Let's start by Moncler, with the revenues by geography. In the H1, Moncler brand revenues reached EUR 935 million, which is a +29% compared to the similar period in 2002. Q2 recorded a 32% growth versus 2022, which is an acceleration versus the 28% of Q1, is mainly due to the improvement that we recorded in China and in Asia. Asia, which includes for us, Asia Pacific, Japan, and Korea, in Q2, accelerated to 55%, to +55% growth versus 2022.
APAC recorded a strong sequential improvement, favored by an easy base of comparison, as we had some close closure last year due to the COVID, both in April and May. Japan and Korea continued to record solid double-digit growth, while for EMEA, revenue increased by 30% in 2022, in the continuity of what we have seen during quarter one, where the business increased by 29%. During second quarter, the demand has been driven by tourist outside region, mainly Chinese, Korean and Americans, while we have been seen still strong, still, sorry, double-digit growth on local, but a kind of normalization on the locals. Americas declined by 5% in Q2 due to the impact of the Nordstrom conversion in the wholesale channel.
The DTC channel continued to record solid double-digit growth, and excluding Nordstrom impacts, growth in Q2 would have been low single digit positive for the region. We move to the revenues by channel. Moncler D2C reached EUR 757 million in H1, which is a +37% compared to 2022. This is a comp growth of 35% for H1, with a solid contribution from all the region. In the second quarter, D2C grows by 45% versus 2022, supported by strong double-digit growth in all the three region, with Asia outperforming the other region. The direct online channel also continue with good, strong, double-digit growth. Wholesale revenues rose to EUR 177 million in H1, up 2% versus 2022.
In the second quarter, revenues were flat year-on-year, impacted by the Nordstrom conversion in the US, with the performance in the other region remained solid. Excluded impact of Nordstrom conversion, the wholesale China would have grown mid-single digit year-on-year compared to 2022. Let me walk you through the Q2 highlights for Stone Island. In the Q2 highlights, before talking about the brand and some of the marketing initiative, we need to talk about also the recruitment that we had and the fact that we are entering now in the second phase, as explained by Remo, with the recruitment of Robert Triefus, but also we have recruited a new CMO, a new digital officer. Clearly, we are still in the transition phase, moving to a D2C business with a strong focus on retail excellence.
The focus will be also the, for the next month and years on the visibility of the brand, increasing the share of voice, increasing the level of engagement, and in reaching the product offer. This being said, let's look at what have been the key initiatives for the quarter. First of all, you know that with Stone Island, we have a strong commitment to research and experimentation, and this was showcased again during the Milan Design Week with the installation of the Prototype Research_Series 07, which is a special thermochromic technology with a liquid crystal interactive ink, used for a limited edition of 100 pieces that were sold out in just a few hours.
Stone Island also staged at the Barcelona Festival with a strong visibility. We were present at the Glastonbury Festival with the English rapper, Dave, who performed in front of more than 200,000 people at the Glastonbury, dressed in the spring/summer 2023 Stone Island Shadow Project look, which was also giving strong visibility to the brand. If we look at the results by geography, Stone Island grew by 5% to EUR 201.6 million in the course of H1. The performance of Q2 was in line with the performance of Q1, but with a different mix by geography.
Asia, which includes Asia Pacific, Japan, and Korea, like for Moncler, grew 13% year-on-year, due to a solid performance in the Chinese mainland and Japan, and some perimeter effects following the 2002 wholesale to DTC conversion in Japan that took place in August last year. The Korean market was softer, also due to the impact of the ongoing changes in the business model. I have opportunity to talk about that. EMEA grew 8% in Q2 versus 2022, driven by a positive contribution from both channels, both D2C and also the wholesale business. Americas saw a decline of 31% in Q2, as wholesale performance continued to be impacted by a softer business trend and a more cautious approach for the department store as a result of this volatility.
In terms of result by channel, we see a wholesale channel for H1, a minus, at -4%. In the second quarter, revenues in this channel grew 2%, despite the impact of the Japanese conversion that was mentioned before, took place in August last year, and the strict volume control that we adopted in the management of this channel. This is also valid for Moncler. We'll have also opportunity to talk about our wholesaler approach during the Q&A. The revenues in the DTC channel reached EUR 73 million in H1, which is a +23% year-on-year. In Q2, the revenue of the channel grew by 9%, mainly due to solid double-digit growth in EMEA, Asia, Pacific, and Japan, but with a more softer performance in Americas and in Korea.
Let me drive you also through the opening that we have had in the second quarter. As you know, it's always a more softer timing for us in terms of opening. We concentrate most of our openings during Q3 and Q4. We are reaching now 257 US for Moncler and 74 US for Stone Island. If you look at the picture, I wanted to outline this time, not so much the opening, but more all the effort that has been done in terms of enhancing the visibility of Moncler and the, let's say, the elevation that we are working on, and the new client experience we are proposing.
We have the beautiful picture of the store in Zurich, in Bahnhofstrasse, located between two key brands, two luxury brands. We more than tripled the business. I'm happy to see that the growth is following the growth of the number of square meter that we have. This is a 600 square meter store on two levels, with the first one with a garden, that we are going to animate both in summer and in winter. In the following picture, another emblematic move that we have done in Shanghai Plaza 66, where for the first time, we are having visibility on the ground floor. It's a store that is developing on three different levels.
Also here we are more than double the surface of the store, with the visibility on the ground floor and with also here, sales that are following the increase of the square meter that we have. Let me hand over the word to Luciano for the group income statement. Thank you.
Thank you, Roberto. Good afternoon, everybody, and thank you all for attending our call today. We're now at page 16, where we report our group PNL that shows a very good top line, just commented by Roberto. Very good top line, thanks to a very strong DTC business, which drove a very healthy gross margin, 110 basis points higher than last year. Interesting to note, our selling expenses are lower on a percentage basis than last year. This is because the strong DTC growth was mainly an organic growth, enabling our stores to improve their productivity. G&A, slightly better than last year, still on a percentage basis of course. Nothing particular to comment.
Marketing, important to highlight that we spent in the first half of the year, double than last year, with an incidence on revenues of 8.9%, 350 basis points higher than last year. This is due to the concentration, sorry. This is due to the concentration of some important marketing activities in the first half of the year. First, our great Genius event in London in February, but also Moncler Grenoble activities, and as Gino said before, our first ever Moncler summer campaign. Notwithstanding this high spending, we still maintain for the year-end, our original guidance of about 7% marketing spending, in line with the last year, with still an important amount of marketing to be spent in the second half of the year, but with the lower incidence on revenues.
EBIT operating margin, slightly behind last year, 19.2% against 19.6%, but after the impact of the higher market spending we just talked about. Below the line of operating margin, nothing particular to comment except the taxes, not adjusted for this year, because taxes this year are back to normal, 29.6 tax rate. Important to remind you, but I'm sure you know, that the last year taxes reflected the one-off positive impact of the Stone Island brand value alignment, which made our taxes unusually positive. Okay, let's move now to page 17, where we report CapEx. CapEx in the first half of the year, represented 6.1% of revenues, much higher than last year, but last year, you may see the, by the chart that, there was some kind of timing effect.
In fact, at the end of the year, we spent 6.4%. For this year, we still expect a total CapEx for the year end in the region of 6% on revenues. Of course, more or less equally distributed between distribution network and infrastructure. Page 18 now, networking capital. Networking capital is still a very healthy percentage, 8.6%, a little bit higher than the 8% we reported last year, due to the higher inventory as compared to last year. Higher inventory that is totally due to an anticipation of the production cycle for this current season, decided to better serve our markets, our stores, and our customers.
Page 19 now, where we report net financial position, EUR 470 million net cash, down as compared to the 2021 year end, that was EUR 818 million, mostly due to the EUR 300 million dividend payment. Page 20, balance sheet, nothing to comment, honestly. Page 21, cash flow statement, nothing particular to comment, but of course, should you have any question on any items we have not commented, please ask the question. You are very, very welcome. Thank you for your attention. We are now ready for your questions.
Thank you. This is the Chorus Call Conference operator. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touchtone telephone. To remove yourself from the question queue, please press star and two. Please pick up the receiver when asking questions. Anyone who has a question may press star and one at this time. The first question is from Aurélie Hassan with HSBC. Please go ahead.
Yes, good afternoon, everyone. three questions, if I may. The first one is, could you comment on the trends in July 2023, and how they differ from Q2, if they do? Second question is the growth in mainland China and with the Chinese cluster in Q2. My last question will be for Roberto. Roberto, would you be kind enough to remind us the nature and terms of your contract with Moncler? Thank you very much.
Thank you, Aurélie. I think the three question are for me, by the way. Let me start by the trends, the trends in July. As you have seen, we have had an exceptional exit in Q2, driven by let's say, a lower base of comparison for the Chinese market. Clearly, we are going to see on China itself, a normalization during Q3. While we see also a very strong rebound of the tourism that is positively impacting the initial result of July.
This being said, as a word of caution, we know that the year is long, and what we see in July may not be what is going to be reflected at the end of the year, let's say. For China, I would say a kind of normalization in the growth internally, and a strong growth that we see in the tourism outside region. Just to give you a flare of what it represents, last year, during H1, we had more than 80% of the consumption that was a local consumption throughout the different region, as an average. Currently, we are at two-thirds local consumption and one-third on tourists that are traveling to other regions.
Clearly, we see here a very strong rebound of mainly the Chinese traveling first to neighboring region like Hong Kong and Macau, that we start seeing also Chinese traveling to Japan and to Korea. Regarding Europe, we are still at half of the travelers from China compared to 2019, but they represent already now the first nationality in Europe, and it's something that didn't happen since the start of the pandemic in 2020.
We look at the results of the Chinese cluster, so the Chinese that are inside China and outside China, and we make the comparison compared to 2021, which is a more meaningful comparison, because as I mentioned last year, April and May, most of our stores were closed in China. We have been growing more than 50% compared to 2021. With an acceleration in Q2, we see that the effect of having the Chinese traveling is helping to grow the Chinese cluster. If we talk about the other region, they continue to perform very strongly. We have Japan, that is performing well.
Korea, a little bit less locally, kind of normalization in the consumption normally, even if we are still double-digit growth, growing double-digit. We see them starting to travel, and especially to Europe. They represent today the second nationality at the same level of the American. Talking about Europe, a normalization on the consumption of the local clients. Let's say they are still double-digit, but not to at the same level at the start of the year. Clearly, the growth that we have seen with this +30% for Europe, has been driven by the tourists outside region, Americans, Korean, and Chinese. Japanese are still very soft in terms of traveling.
If we talk about the Americas, we have had a double-digit growth on the D2C business, clearly the performance that you see at -5% is mainly driven to the change of business model that we are operating currently in the US Change of business model regarding the wholesale, you know that with Europe, Americas is one of the strongest region in terms of wholesale. I would say was, because we want to elevate the brand perception, and we want to get more control about the market. This started with, in May with Nordstrom, where we change it to what we call a hybrid model.
By hybrid, what we mean is that we are co-owning the salespeople that are pushing and that are presenting and selling our product, and we are working with Nordstrom on a soft personalization that is enhancing also the brand perception. They are benefiting from all the activity that we are doing in terms of clienteling and also on our system of auto-replenishment. Clearly, this will drive the performance, but usually when we change business model, the impact will be seen after two semesters on the retail, while you have a negative impact on the short term, because obviously, they have not been buying the full winter, so this will have a negative impact for the quarter three and quarter four for our wholesale business.
At the same time, for the US, we are close to sign the deal with Saks. It's to a point that is just of something formal regarding the store on the Saks Fifth Avenue. This will also, it will be converted during the last part of the year in Q4. We are getting also control of the most important store of the Saks network, and we are advanced negotiation regarding Saks.com. This will also have further in negative impact on the wholesale business, but clearly a positive impact in terms of the way we are guiding the brand, the way we are managing the brand, the way we are elevating the brand on the American market.
Now we have the, basically the second player with Nordstrom, the third player with Saks, and the fourth player with Bloomingdale's, that are directly controlled with us or are about to be controlled by us. We have very good relationship with Neiman, that will remain in wholesale as our number one account. You wanted also me to. Remind what the second question was.
Yes.
In China.
With the, in mainland China, in Q2.
What I think I answer on this by, you know, explaining that we have sequentially increased our performance on the Chinese cluster with a growth compared to 2021, that is above 50%, so a strong growth. Nothing more to say.
Yeah, but that's okay.
The balance of... Yeah, the this for Q2, this is for H1, to be more precise. It was slightly above 50% during Q2, and slightly below 50% compared to 2021 in Q1.
... the balance between how much will be a local consumption, how much will be a consumption driven outside of China, this honestly is difficult to tell. For us, we're monitoring the weight of the Chinese globally in China and outside China. Regarding your last question, say that my contract is aligned with the mandate of executive board member that I have. It's a contract that has been renewed already in the past, and I'm fully committed to Moncler and to the Moncler Group.
Thank you.
The next question is from Melania Grippo with BNP Paribas. Please go ahead.
Good evening, everyone. This is Melania Grippo from BNP Paribas Exane. First of all, congratulations on a very strong quarter. I have a couple of questions. First, is on the gross margin. You increased it strongly in the first half. Could you please give us a little bit more detail behind this increase? I understand it's due to the DTC channel strength, also, if we can expect a similar increase for the full year. My second question is on the Grenoble line. If you could please give us some granularity on the performance of your Grenoble summer line versus the main collection. Finally, on footwear, if you can also tell us on how the category performed as opposed to, for example, your total retail? Thank you.
Okay, Melania, thank you for your question about gross margin. You're right, gross margin was very good. Honestly, it was good, mainly due to the channel mix, because, as we said before, we grew a lot in the DTC, in the retail, physical retail and online. Of course, you know that we deliver a higher gross margin in our DTC business. Of course, what is also very important to highlight, as Anthony said before, is that notwithstanding the growth in our DTC business, our selling expenses were lower on percentage basis, and this is a very, very strong and very good sign for our business. About the end of the year, still difficult to predict.
I can tell you that the DTC business is growing for sure, more than the wholesale business, also for the reasons Roberto just said before to the first question. I mean, we are focusing more and more also to convert some of our wholesale business to DTC business. For this reason, you may expect the gross margin to keep growing. Of course, the other side of the coin is that as we grow the DTC business, the retail business, we have also normally higher selling expenses. This was not the case in the first half, but this is something that you may expect. Thank you.
Melania, how are you? Gino here. Again, just follow up on two things. I think you asked us a little bit of Grenoble. I think, as I mentioned at the beginning, this was the kind of the first year cycle that we are showcasing Grenoble all year round. A bit more into the details, of course, we really experienced a very strong sell-through on the spring-summer collection that we launched this year. Last year was the very first we did spring-summer, so this year we have a double-digit growth against that last year. The newness of this year was that we have pre-fall as well, at the very end of June, as I mentioned at the beginning of the call. I think we are seeing a very good start.
Again, we're just at 25 days in, into that. I think what we're seeing is a really strong reception in terms of the product, the full collection, I would say. Even in terms of how the product is, is performing and, and this need of having product essentials, I would say, for the outdoors. We're seeing a very strong reception, especially in Europe, China and the US, where we are seeing a little bit of a, of a good momentum in terms of the outdoor activities as well. That's what I will, I will share regarding Grenoble. Regarding footwear, I think, I think our sales are up high double digits in Q2, in Q2 right now.
I would say that probably the biggest driver is what we discussed in the past probably 12 months about our main focus on Trailgrip, and the full family of Trailgrip is performing really well. We are, of course, satisfied with those results, and those results are coming up from both sides, both DTC and wholesale. I think the other big thing for us in terms of footwear is the opportunity, of course, to not only connect with our current customer, but it's becoming a source of engagement and connection with new customers. I will always say the same, probably will get bored about this, but the comment on footwear is we don't even have a year of the new product.
Despite that we're having a really strong initial results, I think it's important for us to grow this business in the most authentic way possible. That's what we're doing, and definitely we are happy with the results we're seeing, and more importantly, with the consumer demand and the acceptability of the product in the market.
Thank you.
Of course.
The next question is from Oriana Cardani with Intesa Sanpaolo. Please go ahead.
Yes, good evening, and thank you for taking my two questions. The first concerns the growth profile in the first half. What is the contribution of price mix, volume of organic growth, and can you quantify the perimeter effect? The second question concerns the evolution of online business. What is the current weight of online business on retail sales? Thank you.
Okay, thank you, Oriana, for your question. About the first question, I mean, our growth in the first half of the year was more or less two-third the volumes and one-third the price. Did I answer your question? Okay.
Sorry?
Oriana, sorry, we couldn't hear you very well. Was your question?
Oh, okay.
just about the, volume versus price contribution to the comp? Did we get it correctly?
Yes.
Okay.
Yes, sure. This is the first question. If you can also give us the perimeter effect on the total growth.
Yes, I mean, on the space-
The first part of it.
Okay, space contribution. Space contribution, I mean, you see, looking at the numbers, that there are about three, four points of difference between our comp growth rate and our total growth in the DTC channel. This is more or less the space contribution. Actually, to be honest with you, it's higher than that because our outlets that are not reported, that do not contribute to our comp, performed worse than the regular stores. I mean, still well, but less than our regular stores. You can say that our space contribution was higher than 4%.
If I may just add something, the performance on the outlets has been weaker also because we have had a very good level of sales during the last season. It's more a matter of product availability for the outlet channel, more than the desirability of the brand. As you know, we don't manufacture for the outlets. It's just a channel to get rid of the excess stock. The excess stock was lower. For us, the growth, which is still a low double-digit growth, is not in line with the rest of the D2C, just for a matter of product availability.
Okay, thank you very much.
Hello, good afternoon. Regarding the question on digital, the first thing I have to say is, of course, the online business is continue to grow, double-digit growth. Both on the first half and in Q2, this is broadly in line with the DTC growth that we have been sharing during the call today. In terms of the total weight, we'll only give this reference at the end of the year. We know we finish around 16% of the total contribution in last year, at the end of 2022. We keep continuing to grow, and we will definitely show at the end of the year the growth coming online.
I hope this give you a full, more or less a picture of what's going on and how it's performing.
Okay, thank you.
Of course.
The next question is from Luca Solca with Bernstein. Please go ahead.
Yes, good evening. My first question is possibly for Remo. There is a new C-level executive joining the company, Robert Triefus. This seems to be quite a significant development. I'm wondering, how do you define success with Stone Island? When you looked at Robert in the eyes, what goals and what hard achievements did you discuss with him and you put in front of him so that his contribution can be seen as a significant step forward for the Stone Island project? Is that just a broad based mandate to giving him? Are there any one, two or three things, quite matter of fact things, that have to be achieved in the next two or three years for this to be considered success?
My second question goes back to retail space productivity. There's been a progressive increase in retail space productivity that you've been talking about. I wonder if you could give us any sense of how retail space productivity is at this point relative to 2019, and how the gap between Stone Island and Moncler is being bridged, if at all. The third question relates to the third quarter, well, just asking you if our logic is right here. There seems to be quite a significant rebound in tourist inflows to Europe. You were talking about 2/3 of Chinese demand appearing in the mainland, 1/3, which is more than, for example, LVMH was saying last night, in abroad?
I wonder if, we're wrong to assume that the third quarter is actually going to benefit from tourists buying for winter products ahead of the season, if there's anything, sort of off with this logic, it should be a very good third quarter, given also that you have quite a significant price gap between Asia and Europe? Thank you very much indeed.
Hi, Luca. starting for the beginning of the story, as I mentioned before, you know, Stone Island was amazing brand for us in , was very close of our mentality.
in our vision. I soon realized that the company was, very concentrated on all sale, and the culture and the mentality was very off sale in the sportswear company. The first couple of years, we really turned the company. We tried to control all the distribution. That was my priority, to not have any more distributor or franchise, you know, whatever is a third party. This is the job we did in the last 24 months. Starting the second phase, we decide a few months ago to have, to hire guys very concentrated on brand, very concentrated on the future of the brand, very concentrated on turn the company from wholesale to DTC.
Change the culture in the company is one of the most difficult things, but we feel now in the, after two years, that we are on the way. Having said that, the mission we have on the table, we talk every day with Robert, is one of the most important thing is, as I said, is wholesale turn to DTC, but the second point is really turn this company from logo approach into a brand approach. That, for me, is really a totally different approach, a totally different view of this brand. Third point is, I think we wanna really take the company more in the premium world.
I don't wanna say luxury, I don't wanna say any level of distribution, but more in the premium world. We start already, we start already to rebuild the stores, to have new stores, to have a new retail excellence, to have new approach. The second phase is just start now, because Robert just joined us, and I think we have a clear project in front of us, a clear idea in front of us. We are very optimistic that we can develop a journey in the next, like, I don't know, two, three years. I think we have quite a good possibility, even if the market, as you know now, is not 100%, on the sportswear, let's call sportswear, sports a good approach, is much more sophisticated.
What we feel is Tonale is really in the good, in the good segment, because it's sportswear, but is the most sophisticated brand in this area. Means, in term of product, we are quite happy. We have to fine-tuning little bit the product and little bit the quality, but mostly is to change the face versus the communities and try to attract the other communities and new communities all around the world.
Thank you.
Good evening, Luca. Roberto speaking. let me walk you through your question regarding retail space productivity. the first half of the year has been good. We are above the record year of 2019. I would say quite satisfied with let's say, key performance indicators on the retail side that are all good. We increase the traffic in the stores. There was a slight decrease in the conversion, which is usually what happens when you have a double-digit increase in terms of traffic. There has been no resistance on the price increase. You have heard from Luciano that third of the growth is coming from volumes and one third from from the price.
UPT has continued to increase. I think the basic to do better than 2019 are there. As a reminder, this was the record year at EUR 36.7 thousand. I think we are confident that we can do better than the record year of 2019. You know our ambition. We'll see by the end of the year how close we'll be of this ambition. We are working very hard, very hard on this for the second half of the year. Clearly, also, the tourism is going to help.
Which makes me make the link with your third question, which was: What do we expect from the third quarter, and what will be the impact of the tourist? Maybe just a small, so I would like to rectify, I don't know if I communicated it, but when I was talking about globally, we have two third of consumption that is local and one third that is tourism, I was not referring to the Chinese, I was referring to total tourists. I was referring to the Americans, to the Korean, and to the Chinese. We have seen a significant increase of Korean and Americans. This is counterbalanced by a softer, let's say growth that we have seen locally on this nationality.
Kind of normalization of the consumption in Korea, in Europe, and the Americas. I think both on the global is more positive than negative, but I will not assume that we'll continue to grow strongly on the locals plus the tourism. I think we're going to see a softer, you know, a softer performance on the locals and probably tourism that will be continuing to increase. By how much, this we don't know yet. We'll need this will be needed to assess during the course of the second half. Concerning the KPIs on Stone Island, we are still at the phase of at the start of this transition phase.
We have been moving the main markets into a D2C approach with Korea, with Japan, with the UK. We are in the process of doing this with China in December of this year. There is also in the pipeline, the internalization of the online, on which we're working very, very hard to be able to do it by August next year. This is still a working process and really a change of business model, a change of culture inside of the company. I think we'll be able to communicate on metrics when this transformation will be done, and we'll start working on the second phase, as I was mentioning before, which is increasing the visibility, the brand positioning, the engagement, and the product strategy.
This will start being visible in quarter four of this year, and this is where Robert and his team is currently concentrating.
Wonderful. Thank you very much indeed. Good luck to Robert and, congratulations. Thank you.
The next question is from Edouard Aubin, with Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.
Good evening. One follow-up for Roberto and one question for Luciano. Roberto, sorry if I missed it, but in terms of nationalities for the Americans and the Koreans, could you please give us, you know, the year-over-year growth for Q2 and how it compares to Q1? Again, apologies if I missed it, but I'd be interested to know, number one. Then my question for Luciano: if I'm not mistaken, you know, at constant marketing spend, I think your EBIT margin expanded by about 300 basis points year-over-year. I guess you know where I'm getting to.
Is given that your marketing spend is gonna be only slightly up on a full year basis, you know, doesn't your guidance of about 30% EBIT margin for the year looks quite conservative on the back of the beat in H1? Thank you.
Good evening, Edouard Aubin. Regarding the nationalities, as I was mentioning, all the main nationalities, the top 10 nationalities have been growing double digits. We have seen a softening a little bit on the UK and Germany during this period, which is not as strong as the Asian nationalities. Also, the Japanese are double digits, but let's say a low double-digit growth for Japan. What we have seen is a growth above 40% for Korea, and as I was mentioning, for China, the growth has been above 100%, but this is linked to the base of comparison that was very low.
I think what is a more meaningful comparison is 2021, where for H1, the growth compared to 2021 has been above 50% for the Chinese nationalities. Regarding US, we have been growing above 20% for H1.
Yes. Hi, Edward, thank you for your question. This is a very nice conversation, our operating margin and potential operating leverage. I mean, you're right, in the first half of the year, if we normalize our marketing spending, our EBIT margin would have been significantly higher than last year. Again, we still have the second half of the year, which is much more important in a very complex and uncertain scenario. I mean, any estimate to increase our operating margin, honestly, is very, very aggressive. On the other side, I have to tell you that it's not, it's not at all in our mind, because, as we said other times, I mean, our target is to touch, hopefully the 30% margin, and no more than that.
Again, our first priority is to keep investing in this company, to keep investing in the brand. That is not only investing in the product, in the design, it is investing in marketing, it is investing in distribution, but also investing in our organization, in people, in talents. This is the reason, I'm sorry to say it again, because you may be tired to listen to me, but these are really an important part of our strategy. It's not because we don't like to do more than 30%, but it is because we believe that there are things more important for our long-lasting business and long-lasting brand than the 30% higher than 30% margin. Again, your mathematical calculation is totally correct, but again, this is not our target.
Thank you.
The next question is from Thomas Chauvet with Citi. Please go ahead.
Good evening, everyone. I've got two questions, please. The first one, Luciano, could you come back to the inventory increase of 35% year-on-year, if I'm not mistaken? You said it was deliberate. How does that tie up with the normalization in DTC growth that is implied by consensus in the second half, also difficult wholesale markets, Stone Island retail slowing down quite a bit in Q2. Could you also say perhaps how much of the total inventory of EUR 487 million at the end of June is Stone Island, please? Secondly, could you comment on what you're seeing at the bottom of the price pyramid, particularly in the US? I think earlier this year, you said there wasn't much difference in terms of sales by price points.
Are you seeing any change there with, you know, maybe sneakers or some of the entry-level outerwear or knitwear, a bit weaker in some geographies as some of your peers are, have been experiencing in the second quarter in particular? Thank you.
Okay, thank you. Thank you, Thomas, for your question about the inventory. Inventory growth is quite important. Honestly, we don't report the numbers by company, but in any event, of course, the vast majority of the inventory is in Moncler. This is, as I said before, totally due to the decision to anticipate our production cycle. This is something we decided together. We believed that was good for the markets. Of course, on the other side, we increased a little bit our networking capital. I mean, at the end, I think that the decision was a wise decision for the business and for the brand. I mean, the inventory is vast majority, the current fall winter inventory, so inventory that we just started to ship out to the regions.
Something important to add, even if, I'm sure you remember, our allocation policy is that, I mean, we allocate only a part of the inventory to the regions and to the stores, and then we monitor their trend, and based on their trend, we reallocate that inventory depending on their business trend. Again, nothing honestly important to highlight, simply in anticipation of the production cycle. That means that, I mean, it's a finished product for this current season, but also work in progress and raw materials.
Yes, on your second question, Thomas, regarding the pyramid on pricing, we have not seen a material change also because when we talk about spring/summer, structurally, our price pyramid is also lower than the one of fall/winter. We sell much more knitwear during that period. It's also a period where we sell more to men than to women, compared to the winter season, and we have not seen a material change in the mix of the buying. Clearly, we see also, and it's a little bit too early, because we are selling the fall/winter only since a couple of weeks.
We know that there is a demand for less logo and more refined product that we have in our edit collection. Clearly, this is going to be something that has a higher price point, so I'm expecting our price mix to go slightly up during the fall/winter season, but not something that is material.
Thank you, Roberto, and maybe just on pricing, are you think you are able to pass on another 10% price increase on the next spring/summer collection? I know it's a bit early, but you've done two times 10% pricing on that spring/summer collection. Do you feel the current environment is set up so that you can pass on that pricing again at the start of 2024?
We have just finished the spring/summer campaign, and the price increase that we have is not as high as in the past. As you know, the price increase, the two times 10% for spring/summer, fall/winter, the last season, were linked to a increase of cost, production cost and in terms of material costs that we have fully embedded in the pricing without lowering the margin. This has had no impact for Moncler on the, let's say, on the result. As you have seen, our growth is mainly driven by volumes for this first half of the year.
We don't have, we have a lower price increase for the, for the next, spring/summer, and we have not seen resistance, material resistance on that during the selling campaign.
Okay. Thank you, and all the best.
Thank you.
The next question is from Louise Singlehurst, with Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.
Hi, good evening, everyone. Thank Thank you for taking my questions. I just had two, if I can, please, just to follow up. Obviously, fantastic results in the first half. You must all be absolutely delighted with the momentum. Can you tell us about the cohort mix and the difference between what you're recruiting as a new customer and also the existing customer, i.e., the penetration or increasing loyalty across those existing customers, and particularly with reference to the actions or the benefits from Genius and also the new product categories which are coming through? My second question, I wonder if you can talk to us about how you measure the success of Genius and all the activities in the first half and the marketing.
We can see that very clearly in the sales momentum. I presume I'm thinking more longer term. I presume there is a benefit with a longer tail from all the initiatives that you've put in in the first half, and that will benefit, you know, the next six, 12 months of what you've seen historically with marketing spend? Thank you.
Louise, thank you. Gino here. I think, let me start from probably the second one. I think, of course, we can share multiple data regarding Genius, and I think, during the Q1, Helene and the team did a great job sharing a little bit of the numbers. Of course, sometimes it's more difficult to truly quantify the real impact of certain things, but what we see, to connect it to your first question is, first of all, yes, we see a real impact of Genius on the brand.
Already by looking at some of the information we shared already earlier today in terms of the demand we're seeing for the brand, of course, when you look at the revenue growth, of course, when you look into the traffic into the stores, or when you even look into the traffic online, all the level of engagement we have seen on digital platforms. Normally, I personally always says the same, I think one great way to look at the return of investment of things like this, is to look at the health of the organic traffic that the brand has. I think in a world like today, where sometimes you can be heavy dependent on paid media, I think when you look at the organic traffic of the brand, it's a really good way to look at that.
I think that's the way we like to see the impact of it and that opportunity. Connected, the reason I start with the second question is because connected to Genius or connected to the opportunity to drive engagement with new customers, I think this is something that we engineer, right? Everything was by design. I think what we wanna do is invite new communities into the brand and open up authentic ways for new customers to connect with us. I think what we're seeing, which was something that for us is important, is we're seeing still a strong loyalty from the current customer or the current community of customers who have been Moncler lovers for some time now.
We're seeing, of course, and this is more segment by segment, of course, we're seeing great introduction into new customers when we start looking about footwear. When we start looking into classifications outside outerwear, when we look into some of the Genius collections, like again, and we will report more things as we go, not only what we saw in Fragment Alicia Keys, but what we're seeing today with Salehe Bembury. Again, I think I wanna go back probably to the most simple part of this is by design, when we share with you the opportunity to have one brand with three very clear dimensions, the dimension of the brand is, of course, connected to the opportunity to have complementary audiences that we really wanna be meaningful to.
I think what we are seeing is that the return of that strategy is starting to pay off in terms of not only the revenue, because revenue at the end is a consequence of what we do. It's in terms of the different level of engagement that we have with current customers and with new communities, depending on the three dimensions that we're talking about.
Great. Thank you.
The next question is from Susy Tibaldi with UBS. Please go ahead.
Good evening, thanks for taking my question. The first one on wholesale, Can you give us a little bit of an indication what we should expect for the third quarter? It's quite important for wholesale, and now you're doing these conversions. Should it be similar to what we have seen so far, so around flattish? A second question for Luciano, again, going back to the point on margin. I think what we have seen very clearly in this H1 print, is that you are seeing very, very good operating leverage. Sorry, on the selling cost, because you're having great sales density, sales productivity, and it sounds like you expect this trend to continue as well. I think on the selling cost, leverage is probably gonna come through eventually.
I guess the one line where you are increasing a bit of investment is on the G&A costs. Is there anything specific that we should be aware of? Any specific hiring or any specific projects that you can flag? And then on Stone Island, for next year, given that we're entering this second phase of the brand evolution, is that when we should also expect a more meaningful start of the store rollout globally? Thank you.
Hi, Susy. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to better explain the strategy that we are putting in place in terms of wholesale. I think we are now at the level of maturity for Moncler that is pushing us to be even more confident, to fully push our D2C business and to be very selective when we talk about wholesale. We've seen a transformation of the wholesale during the pandemic, and I think we need to elevate, continue to elevate the brand perception. This is valid for Moncler, but also for Stone Island. Stone Island is more linked to a change of business model, as it was explained by Remo, but we want to go more D2C.
We are starting to be more selective in the number of stores that we have in the selection of stores. This will continue, not only for this year, but for the few years to come, and really concentrated on the one that are adding either image or additional clients that we won't get through the online or through our DTC approach. Concerning the US market, this is a big transformation of the market overall, because we are basically taking our destiny in our hands for with the second, the third, and the fourth player, working with them, but getting control about the assortment, getting control about the distribution, leveraging on all the assets that we have been able to develop with our D2C. I was mentioning before, the auto-replenishment, but not only sharing data.
This is going to come and have medium-term, a positive impact in terms of brand elevation, presentation of the product, data collection, and ultimately, as a consequence, additional sales that we'll see on the D2C. Concerning the impact on the short, medium term, here we are talking about Q3 and Q4. I think we can expect the wholesale channel for this part of the year to become mid-to-high single digit negative % overall for the full year. A stronger impact in Q3 and Q4, with an impact that is going to move from a business that is currently flattish, to something that is going to become mid-to-high single digit negative %.
This will depend on the speed of conversion that we have, that we're currently negotiating with Saks, and the approach on being more selective in terms of wholesale distribution. I take maybe also the advantage to answer on Stone Island. For Stone Island. Clearly, the focus as was explained by Remo is to move from a logo approach to a brand approach. What you can expect in terms of focus for the company is not only the retail part and investment.
We do the store, this is something we have started to do, but is more something that is going to become something that is more visible, and where we are going to further increase the reach of the brand, the engagement of the brand, the visibility of the brand, and we are also working on the product. It's a mix of elements and not only investment in retail, redoing, we are very happy about the new concept. This is clearly something that is embedded in what we are going to do in the next year, but it's all this element of visibility and engagement with consumer that where we are going to concentrate, and this will start in Q4 and then accelerating in 2024.
Yes, Susy, about your question on our operating leverage, again, mathematically, you are right. I mean, we developed a very good results in the first half of the year with a very high productivity of our stores due to the organic growth. Should we continue this way, you may be right. However, I have to tell you again, that, I mean, we are focused more on the investments in our brands than on reaching a better EBIT margin. Of course, we normally talk about organization, but if I can add some color, I mean, you know that we have two brands, and both of the two brands need a lot of attention, and attention means people able to manage the complexity of our business. I'm talking specifically about Stone Island.
Stone Island is an amazing brand, and we have to fully exploit the potential of this brand. In order to do that, I mean, we have Robert on board, that has been on board for one month. We have a strong team we are building in the marketing, in digital, and in all the different areas of the business. These are investments, okay? Stone Island is just an example, but I can make many other examples from Moncler. These are the investments we are talking about. Investments are very important, not to chase a better, higher EBIT margin this year, but to maintain a strong, healthy EBIT margin for the next 10, 20 years. This is the simple question, but again, mathematically, you are right.
Okay, thank you.
The next question is from Geoffroy de Mendez with Bank of America. Please go ahead.
Hi, good evening. Thank you for taking my question. I have three of them. The first one is on the level of net cash. I think you're close to EUR 500 million at the end of H1, which is not too far from where you were before you made the acquisition of Stone Island in 2020. I was just wondering what you're thinking in terms of capital allocation, if, you know, external growth is something that you would still be considering, or if it's just too early to think about this at this stage? That's question number one.
The question number two is maybe for Gino on the, on the focus away from outerwear, which, you know, you've been talking about a lot during the capital markets day, a couple of years ago. Clearly, you've made the launch of shoes and now this summer campaign, which seems to be doing quite well. Just an update on where you are on that trajectory and, you know, where we could see the first half of the year growing as a percentage of total sales, once the transition has been done, because, you know, your Q2 is good, but it's still just 11% or like about, you know, 10% to 15% of sales, so it's still a small quarter. Last question is just on the store growth for the Moncler brand.
If you could just remind us, what you've been doing in Q2, and what we should expect for the full year, that would be helpful? Thank you.
Yes, Geoffroy, thank you for your question. I mean, about cash, I mean, you're right, we have a remarkable amount of cash, honestly, this is something, I mean, we like. We're not disappointed. Honestly, what we like, is the cash generation of our business, not just having cash. I mean, to answer your question, I mean, you are right. At the time we had this kind of amount of cash, we decided to make that acquisition, but honestly, as I'm sure you know, you remember, the acquisition was not driven by the amount of cash, but was driven by the fact that we loved, and we loved since ever that brand.
At the time, we were able to connect, I mean, the two families, and to make it happen, we were very happy, independently on the cash available. Right now, I mean, we have cash, but honestly, we don't have any specific project other than the two important projects on our two brands that are Moncler and Stone Island. Honestly, right now, we don't have any, I mean, any idea, any thought, and even less any project to make other acquisitions. It may happen, it may happen in the future, but again, not and whether or not we will have a cash needed to make the acquisition, but whether or not we find a strong brand like the two brands we have in our portfolio.
Good evening, Geoffroy. Regarding the expansion of Moncler, I clearly mentioned at the beginning that big part of the focus also is in expanding existing stores, and we have had very nice project this year with Miami Bal Harbour, with Paris Galeries Lafayette, Zurich Bahnhofstrasse. We have Shanghai Plaza 66, Beijing China World, and we have some exciting project coming for the end of the year, especially with Vienna flagship. What we have been doing in terms of opening this year, we open at the start of the year, there was the opening of London Heathrow. With the restart of the traveling, I would say that again, airport are gaining some relevancy for us.
We have between conversion from wholesale to retail and the contract of Charles de Gaulle has just been signed this week. We are taking them back from Lagardère, we'll start managing that from this week on. These are important investment that we are doing, there are a couple of other airports that are foreseen until the end of the year. We had also some openings at the start of the year with Shinsegae and Hyundai in Korea. We have 10, roughly 10 additional projects that will materialize until the end of the year, that are evenly spread between Europe, Americas and China. This is for the end of this year.
Again, not only focusing on openings, but also very much on expanding and moving, the level of the existing network to another level.
I think the second question was more regarding the focus on new opportunities. Again, I know sounds boring, but I wanna go back to a little bit to the strategy and to the beginning of the conversation. I think, definitely, I think, it's clear on this conversation that we are experiencing a good brand momentum. I think, what we are seeing here is a clear focus and an exercise by all teams regarding the three brand dimensions, the three brand priorities, who are not only helping us to stay more focused, but clearly driving both brand and business results. I think definitely with the opportunity we're seeing here is to really serve, the brand desire and the brand demand we see all year round.
I think it's not necessarily that we are focusing out of the three priorities. I think what we're looking is within the three priorities, where are the opportunities that we can do to have a strong relationship with customers. Summer, of course, you mentioned that, what we're seeing is a strong double-digit growth on new categories for us, like knitwear, cut and sew, and others, as I was just mentioned. I think footwear, I make the comment before about the same thing. We're seeing high double-digit growth this year compared to last year, but I just always want to put the caveat that we are a journey that we just got started. Then, of course, I wanna make sure that it's not either or.
Outerwear is something that we will always obsess, right? It's part of the DNA of the company. We will never trade those things. For us, what's important is to keep adding more opportunities for customers to have a really meaningful brand, meaningful relationship with this brand. That's what we are, that's what we're trying to do. I think it's connected to what you said, what you hear last year. I think what we're trying to do is to become best-in-class in delivering everything we have been promised a year ago in terms of the strategy. Every opportunity that you are seeing there is connected to the three dimensions we've discussed last year as well.
Thank you.
The next question is from Andrea Randone with Intermonte. Please go ahead.
Good evening, and thank you. Just a couple of questions. The first one is, if you can provide us some comments about the space contribution that you are expecting for the full year. I mean, you mentioned a greater number of openings in the second half, so if you can help us. The second question is, just about Korea. Some other players are providing different comments from you, so if you can just spend a few additional comments on your brand positioning in the market, that seems to be very, very good? Thank you.
Yes, Andrea, thank you for your question. I mean, space contribution, we don't change our guidance, that is, mid to high single-digit growth as a space contribution. Of course, as I said before, talking about the first half, you may not see exactly the number I'm talking about at the end of the year, as much as at the end of the first half, because it may depend on the outlet performance. In this first half of the year, outlets performed well, but less well than our regular stores. This made the usual calculation between the compa and the total growth of the DTC business lower than the space contribution.
Space contribution, again, considering that the majority of the stores will be opened in the second half of the year, at the end of the year, is still expected to be mid to high single digit.
Good evening, Andrea. Regarding Korea, yeah, we have had a very strong first half of the year, and to be honest, a fantastic growth throughout the pandemic, since 2020, Korea has been the market that has been growing the most. I think we have very much enhanced the visibility of the brand, in the course of the past three years, and the brand perception in Korea is really excellent. I think also there is a cultural fit of our product with the Korean consumers that are making these alchemies working very, very well.
This being said, we expect on the second half of the year, some normalization of the consumption locally, and some softening of the local local demand, because we start seeing Korean traveling mainly to Europe and to Japan. We believe that the cluster will continue to be obviously positive, but probably a softening of the performance on the local market.
Thank you very much. Very clear.
The next question is from Liwei HOU, with CICC. Please go ahead.
Good evening, gentlemen. Thank you for taking my question. I have two. The first one is, it's really impressive you have managed to record the same growth at constant rates and also at current rates. Apart from our hedging activities, is there any particular reason that we managed to do this, given our high exposure to China and Japan, whose currencies have been depreciating? I think this is particularly outstanding. The second question I have is regarding our vertical integration. I think recently our peers in focus on ready-to-wear have made some moves in acquiring cashmere suppliers.
I understand that's not in our DNA to do cashmere, but is there anything, you know, that you are contemplating right now to further differentiate ourselves, not only from a design perspective, but also from a, you know, fabrics and, you know, raw materials perspective? Thank you very much.
Okay, thank you for your question. About your first question, I mean, you are right. I mean, there is no big difference between our reported growth rate and our constant FX growth rate, and this is exactly thanks to what you said. I mean, we have a very strict hedging policy that permits us to protect our operating margins and of course, to maintain a pretty stable our revenues independently on the FX trend. Of course, this was the case for Japan, for sure, but for China also. I mean, nothing to add to what you said, it is totally correct. About our supply chain, I mean, you are right, many brands are moving to make acquisitions.
I mean, I have to tell you that, I mean, the most important not acquisition, but investment we made, it was last year. It was in the building of the second production facility in our in our production area in Romania. In the second building, that is now up and running, and we aim to double our production capacity, and this is for outerwear only. We also mean keep making some small acquisitions of some small suppliers still in outerwear. We made two acquisitions, small acquisitions, at the end of last year, just to give you an example. Talking about other categories, honestly, I mean, we are looking at the market, we are looking at the potential interesting acquisitions in other categories, like knitwear, for example.
To be honest, we do, while we wait to find something interesting, I mean, we keep investing in our own factory, and right now we have a quite important factory with about 30 machines for knitwear. We keep investing in this facility in Italy, and to make this facility stronger and stronger. Not only from the production point of view, but honestly, from the know how point of view, because while we built this facility over the past seven years, right now, we have developed a very strong knowhow. We will keep investing in this facility, but we keep looking also at what may be interesting in the market. Thank you.
Thank you very much. Very helpful.
The next question is from Paola Carboni, with Equita SIM. Please go ahead.
Yes, hello. Hi, good afternoon, everybody. I have only one question left. It's about Stone Island and its retail performance. I understand we are still in a transition phase, so you don't comment about same store sales or not even overall retail performance of Stone Island too much yet, which is clearly understandable. I just wanted a few comments from your side, if possible, on two aspects. First of all, the kind of elasticity you are seeing from Stone Island customers to the price increases you have implemented in the last few seasons, if you are noticing any kind of different attitude in this respect from Stone Island consumers, compared clearly to Moncler, where you commented about... virtual no resistance.
Secondly, if you can elaborate a bit on what you have been implementing in Korea. Just to take this market as a first example of your actions in developing the retail operations for the brand, and what you have started to see here in terms of evidence of the benefits of your actions? Thank you very much.
Good evening, Paola. Let me answer on the Stone Island part and the work that has been done. You're right, I think it's a little bit too early to let's say, to comment on the retail KPIs, which is something that naturally will come when the transition phase will be over. I think for Korea, we have had a kind of double transition. We had even had twice the relaunch of the retail excellence because we had a market that was not only managed by an importer, but this importer had a range of franchisee that were managing the store.
We first trained them when we took over back in 2021, and we have seen that only a few of them who will have the capability to work in a larger organization with a client focus approach. We change most of the team at the end of last year, beginning of this year, when we did the relaunch of retail excellence. Clearly, this is going to take some time to materialize in terms of positive impact on the market, but we have seen a real change in the attitude of the team. I think for me, one of the KPIs that I may be able to disclose, which is data collection.
All elements, all the elements on which we are working and we have been working for Moncler in the past, started by knowing your clients. If you don't know your clients, if you don't have a solid database, all the work on terms of clienteling is useless because you don't know what you are talking about. This is where I've seen currently the very positive response from the Korean market and the team, is that we have reached now in just a few months, data collection rate that is at 80%, 85%, which is honestly not far from the one we have with Moncler. We start having the base on which we can start investing.
One of the challenges that we have on the current market is that basically between Jeju and Seoul, and Seoul City, we're gathering 90% of the presence on the market. When we start doing the investment in terms of visibility, they can be very concentrated and having a meaningful impact on the short term. This will require a few more months, and this is where the team and especially Robert is currently working. Regarding the price impacts, I think the positive news is that the price impact for the next spring, summer for Stone Island is much lower or almost meaningless as we have been able to develop our collection in a meaningful way without impacting the price.
Clearly, being, let's say a brand that is positioned in terms of average price lower than Moncler, the price increase are on some markets a little bit more, you know, the, let's say, the reaction of the business on Stone Island has been much more driven by the price rather than the volumes. Which is showing that the impact is not like Moncler, where we have been able to work on the brand for the past 10 years or even more, and where we didn't have any impact on the price. Here, the volume that we see, the growth that you see, has been mainly driven by price increase.
Okay, thank you very much.
Thank you very much for the calls. For the questions, sorry. We do have a few questions that came through from the webcast. I'm just gonna read a few of them. I'm just gonna focus on the ones that have not been answered. I think on inventory, we talked about it. Moving on to this question for Gino, How do you see your return on marketing developing, given significant investment by peers in the market?
I think we more or less touch on this. I keep saying, I think the level of focus and precision we're trying to have regarding the strategy is definitely helping us to be a bit more effective and efficient in the way we do marketing. I think, I don't believe necessarily that it's all about investment, it's about the meaning of the brand and what we say and how we interact with customers out there. I think what we believe is that we have the right strategy in place and it's working so far.
I think what we're trying to do, of course, is to obsess every single detail of the way we engage with customers, and that hopefully will keep us driving a strong brand positioning and a strong business result on the back of how we are maximizing every investment we do. It's just not about more money and money, it's about the meaning of what we say and the way we invest against the strategy.
Okay, thank you. Could we give further color on Stone Island versus Moncler EBIT margin?
Yes, I can give you some color, but not numbers. I mean, I can tell you that, I mean, Stone Island, as we said at the very beginning, delivers an EBIT margin that is more or less in line with Moncler, but with some differences. For example, the marketing budget that was, and still is, behind what we are spending in Moncler. I mean, overall, long term, we expect the EBIT margin to be aligned with the Moncler, considering higher marketing spending, but also higher gross margin. Right now, I can tell you that in the first half of the year, this is something that may be unexpected, but the EBIT margin of Stone Island is higher than what we expected.
... we report for Moncler. This is simply because the seasonality of Moncler is much higher than the one for Stone Island. Again, overall, I mean, our target is to maintain a similar equivalent EBIT margin. I mean, with the comments I just made.
I don't know if you want to add anything on, you know, Robert Triefus, you know, key areas of focus and then positive or negatives that he had found. I think we have already elaborated on it, but if you want to add any further color.
I think we mentioned that one of the very important points, not to repeat what I already said, is also the online integration. The online integration will allow us to move into an omnichannel approach, moving from retail excellence to omnichannel excellence. We have already our plans for the first half of next year to get the team prepared in terms of software in the stores, and in terms of change of habit to leveraging, like we have been doing for Moncler, and move from a retail excellence approach to a omnichannel excellence approach. Clearly, the internalization of the online will be an asset on which we are going to work for the next one year.
One final question, I guess for you, Roberto, whether we have seen any impact from the recent heat waves across the globe?
Well, as you know, yes, we have seen extreme heat waves, study reports also that there is an increasing variability in the extreme weather, as we have seen this winter, where we had a very cold weather in North America and in Asia. I think this is what is important, is that in terms of collection, we have been working, and we have now, both for our spring, summer, and for winter collection, they are both warm and light offerings. As it was explained prior, priorly by Gino, we are working also on the multi-layering, which is something that is adding functionality to our outerwear, where we can wear three different type of pieces, both together or the light, the more warm piece together.
It is also increasing the price, average of the outerwear, so it's adding a lot of functionality, and it's something that clearly is one of the assets and elements that we have been developing to counterbalance these extreme weather conditions that we have seen this week or also in Milano with extreme weather conditions.
Okay, fantastic. Thank you very much to everyone for participating in this call. Let me just give you a quick reminder of the next release. Our Q3 results will be on October 26th, after market close, and our quiet period will start on September 27th. Please feel free to contact me for any follow-ups. I'm around tonight, if you need any clarifications on anything that, what was said today. Thank you again. Have a great evening, and we wish you a wonderful summer break.
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for joining. The conference is now over, and you may disconnect your telephones.