Morning, everyone. Welcome to our First Quarter Results Call. I'd like to talk to you a bit about the agenda. We are going to start with the highlights for the quarter, the main points that we have in our results, the highlights for our brands and channels, and finally, the main financial information. We'll wrap up with our traditional Q&A session.
Good morning, everyone. All good. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for your presence. Our conference referring to the results for the first quarter of 2023. I'm very proud to inform that this is our 50th results call since our IPO, and I have the honor to be here after these 12 years of being an open company. We have Vicky, our Investor Relations Manager, and Rafael Sachete, our CFO.
The first quarter of 2023 showed a solid growth and shown our resilience and the 23% growth, very similar to the 22% from the fourth quarter. Within this organic base of Arezzo & Co for brands and channels, this is the running rate for our growth. We are very happy with our results, which shows our gain in market share, the resilience and the strength of our brands. It also shows our ability in a very high efficiency in capital allocation, having a reasonable leverage that will be even higher in our revenue growth quotient. It's important to point out the difference in the Gregorian calendar and the fashion calendar. Remembering the first quarter is characterized by the exit of the summer collection, which presented for all brands great performance for full price.
We have historical figures with no problems in inventory at the end. We can start the pre-fall collection at the end of January. Having as a landmark in the first quarter of 2023 and what dictates our health for the following months is the turn to the winter collection that happened on March 6th. I imagine that you have followed through the media and the stores. Very bold products, very attractive bolds that elevated our brand call. We've been consistent in that, and the results have showed our ability to sell high added value products and also increasing our average ticket. This is our goal, to generate more margin for our chain and sell high added value products. We maintain an excellent beginning for the winter collection.
The first days for the collection had a 5% higher turn in the collection than the same period last year. March is characterized by this turn to winter and April, the continuity and preparation for the biggest sellout event that we have in the first semester as a single day of sales. The Saturday before Mother's Day is our biggest sales day in the year. This period has started within our brands.
There are several activations going on, several campaigns, motivational training, roadshows, great energy placed at the edge, as you must been following, and the results so far have been shown very positive. A bit about our calendar. Our company is synchronized with our selling sellout calendar, and right after Mother's Day, we initiate the process for selling to our franchise and multi-brand sellers for the summer one collection. I invite our Pulsar event.
We'll be in São Paulo on May 16th. Let's go on with our presentation. As we presented, we had a robust growth of 23%, remembering that the first quarter of 2022, we had a growth of 64%. It's strong growth on a very high base, reaching an absolute amount of BRL 1.3 billion in the first quarter. The sales result, considering our franchising, e-commerce and our own stores sell-out mono-brand channels of BRL 947 million, growing 22% in level with the growth of the company. We've been emphasized the work is to have great criteria and follow-up of our client base, a growth of 19% of the active base. Around our brands, our core brands that we'll go deeper into it grew 15%.
Highlights to Arezzo brand, our mother brand, that had 13% growth in this first quarter on top of 37% in first quarter 2022. About our end call with strong growth boosted by the stores opening, multi-brand penetration through mainly by the Gold brand, we reached BRL 287 million of revenue. Consolidated gross margin in the period of 52.4%. Sachet is going to give more details about that. Our EBITDA, our recurrent EBITDA of BRL 164 million. Our net profit of BRL 73 million, a growth of 27%, bigger than our revenue growth, as I had mentioned before. Our ROIC of 27.2%. In this chart, I'd like to look the soundness of our growth. As I said, it's our 50th call, we take advantage to present the history of the first quarter throughout these 12 years.
This shows a company that has a very constant CAGR up to 2021. From that date, the creation of a new revenue base reaching around BRL 1.3 billion in revenue. If you look at the realize of one Q nineteen, Q one nineteen, the company in these four years grew threefold. Of these 50 result calls, I had the pleasure of coming here to present 47 calls with revenue growth and 46 with revenue growth. Despite growth, we never had to give in on margin to support the robust growth of its revenue. About EBITDA, the numbers repeat themselves. Very solid CAGR. In the 50 quarters reported, 42 of growth in EBITDA and 39 with net growth and now showing new levels.
A company that operated in an average of BRL 60 million in EBITDA in the Q1, now in 2023, we're reaching BRL 164 million. We show the recurrence and the soundness and the resilience of Arezzo&Co throughout the decades. I'd like to show the essence in the management of our business, which is to work so that our brands gain market share and manage to increase their audience. At the same time, we have made efficiency in the management of the main selling channels. To the left, you see how the revenue per brand gives us a good distribution with very solid brands. If you add up our end co Schutz and Arezzo and this year in business for the year, we're talking about brands above BRL 1 billion.
Anacapri this year is going to get this half billion BRL, very solid brands. I will go back one slide. There was at one point I didn't mention around the percentage that the first quarter has in the net profit around the total of the year. To the right here below, we place that in the Q1 2022 recurrent net profit represented, represents as of 15% of the consolidated net profit in 2022, which led us to BRL 386 in revenue. It's important to show that the first quarter does not have a relevant way. It's not proportional to the number of days in the year. I apologize, I'm going back here talking about our channels.
The first Q1 had strong growth in our multi-brand channel, reaching a capillarity of more than 7,000 points of sales in all of our brands. We've started the sale of the pre-summer collection. The results are very encouraging. Arezzo that throughout the pandemic, had a unique ability of maintaining self presence together with the multi-brand stores through the implementation of their launch lives with our own studio here and to having deliveries, on-time delivery. This multi-brand channel here tends to grow throughout the year. The digit channels franchise is the selling revenue for this, for Q1, around BRL 300 million, very similar with the revenue for our e-commerce and the adding of our own stores. Really, our company is a multi-brand, multi-channel company. It's a platform of brands.
A bit of the highlights among our brands and then about our channels. Around our five main brands, Arezzo had a growth above 13%. You see the very important behavior here, which is the percentage of e-commerce over the total of the brand. Even Arezzo having more than 450 brick-and-mortar stores, e-commerce corresponds to 20% of the revenue. From the total, from the web, all omni revenue obtained by the store infinite shelf corresponds to 22% of web sales. Schutz, likewise, even more relevant percentages, if 40% of sub sales come from e-commerce, the growth in Brazil was 8.1%. I'll talk a bit about that. Anacapri, you remember throughout the beginning of 2022, there was an adaptation process to a new post-pandemic trend.
In the second semester of last year, the results were positive and they continue in this same strong momentum. The growth of Anacapri above 22% should be maintained throughout 2023.
Around Alexandre Birman, I'd like to point out a figure that's not here. The growth in Brazil was 65%, it's a brand that has a market share in luxury shoes in Brazil of 55%. AR&Co, with exceptional results, a resiliency of the brands within Reserva and its subdivisions, managing to maintain historical base, a very strong growth of 45%. A bit, zoom into our core brands. The Arezzo brand, as I said, strong comparison base. It had grown in the Q1 2022 37%. The sellout channels for the brand, including own stores and multi-brand are the biggest highlights with 41% of growth in our own brands and 21% in multi-brand. Around branding, our investment in elevating the brand awareness of the Arezzo brand making it younger and bringing international renowned people.
A brand such as Arezzo deserves to have the best, the biggest icon of Brazilian fashion representing it, we're very proudly. The work we did with Gisele Bündchen generated a very high turn of the collection. In the first week of sales, 22% and BRL 2 million in the product she was wearing in 15 days. Brizza today, within the Arezzo ecosystem, had a very strong growth in multi-brand, reaching, well, 1,500 points of sale. The Schutz brand, with highlighting multi-brand channel and franchise, 1,200 clients in Brazil, we launched the global campaign with the international model, Candice Swanepoel. Anacapri, from the end of last year, very consistent branding work using Juliet as the model for the brand, bringing this very simple way of being from humble origins that can captivate the audience.
The connectivity of Juliet with Anacapri is perfect. I met with her personally discussing the future of the brand, she is a real user. She's a fan of the brand. This is a partnership that has helped with the branding. As I said before, the Alexandre Birman brand in Brazil, with 65% growth, our 12 stores have minimum revenue of BRL 1 million per month, they're very strong stores. We have a large market share in Brazil. Oami, showing our capacity of being creative using recycled materials, keeping our position true to consumers that buy shoes that are sustainable. We show our power in that segment as well. An X-ray of our acquired brands in the past, ones we acquired in the past three years.
Azzas 2154 platform, as mentioned, has a solid growth, especially multi-brand, boosted by sneakers and digital. Azzas 2154 is very strong with a very interesting connection with the salespeople and how they can access the customers and show and sell that is delivered by e-commerce, which generated 65% growth in digital. That accounts for 28% of the brand. High summer also accounts for the first quarter with our beach collection. They will have a higher presence in the portfolio of the brand, 2023. Vans. Because of confidential information, we can't give numbers from sales. The growth was 55%. Our expectations with the brand at every quarter has been surprising. It has a very good receptiveness in the Brazilian market. Carol Bassi, our investment in the women's apparel segment is very high, 76% growth.
Our store at Shopping Cidade Jardim is a reference. Although we have a high baseline, we achieved an average in the first quarter of above BRL 4 million in one single store, improving our operations in e-commerce and also showing good growth in the multi-brand segment. To close this chapter about Reserva Go, BRL 175 million in revenue in 2022. It's a very strong brand in a very short time. Oficina, I would like to invite all of you in São Paulo to go see the store at JK Shopping. It's amazing. The first month already, BRL 1 million in revenue. It's a brand that can grow very much in Arezzo ecosystem. Mini is creative and for kids that are preteens, it's ideal for that age group. Baw strengthened its position and closed the month of April with strong growth and now.
Already in the multi-brand segment. Going to go deeper in our main sales channels. Looking at the sell-out, that includes all our brick-and-mortar stores and franchise, which obviously doesn't go through our financial statement, plus our own stores and e-commerce. The total achieved was BRL 974 million, with a 22% growth year-over-year. Highlight to Vans that not only for opening new stores, but also the Same-Store sale with a 48% growth and AR&Co grew 44%. It's worth mentioning that the comparison basis year-over-year was 66%, and we already achieved a revenue almost equal to the third quarter of last year, and the sell-out calendar has a higher weight. On the baseline that we start planning for 2023, the data will be outstanding.
About our multi-brand distribution and franchise, our B2B, both with strong growth. Franchise are selling... The index between the sell-in and sell-out was 22%, so a good lever for the franchisee achieving BRL 298 million in franchise in 2023. Our own stores with BRL 252 million growth. Multi-brand, 35% growth year-over-year. A channel that gives us capillarity with a gross margin slightly higher than a franchise. We have good portfolio orders, and it's possible to continue growing at this range throughout 2023. Looking at the past 12 months, the multi-brand channel achieved BRL 1.4 billion. I'm almost concluding my part. I would like to highlight the power that Arezzo&Co has in web com-commerce.
When we launched Schutz in the web commerce, it's a reason of pride to have this platform and our leadership and the verticalized digital ecosystem from customer experience stores or platforms, which generated BRL 279 million in revenues this quarter. E-commerce sales, we dream to achieve BRL 1 billion. If we look to the past 12 months, we already went over BRL 1 billion. With the strong growth in traffic, we have almost an organic search for these brands on the internet, generating a total of 74 million users in this quarter. The main brands, Arezzo, Schutz, Anacapri and Reserva, have their proprietary app with lower marketing expenses. There's a cost to download, the customer becomes more loyal in the digital channel.
40% growth of total sales on the apps, which account for 231% of the total e-commerce revenue. We also had an increase of the web commerce tickets of 27%. Influenced sale means every sale that, despite being done in the brick-and-mortar store, starts with a digital contact, especially through WhatsApp, with a tool that was implemented by the company during the pandemic. Even with the return of people going to the malls, our sales team continue using this type of contact, generating 42% of the sell-out through digital communication. As I said, it's a company that has their customers at the tips of their fingers and uses data as a tool of management and relationship with the customers. In the past 12 months, we achieved the 5.5 million people buying at our stores.
A little bit more detail of our omni clients. We all know that they have a higher percentage of purchases. 22% of new customers that entered our base, 10% of clients that were reactivated. We also had omni growth that generated the highest volume of sales in our company. This shows the power of all our channels. I would like to pass the floor to Rafael Sachete, who will show our financial highlights.
Thank you, Alexandre. Good morning. Thank you for being with us here on our conference call. Talking about our revenues, we achieved BRL 1.285 billion in the quarter, as Alexandre mentioned. Great performance in all channels and company brands. CMV and gross profit achieved 19.6% in the quarter, with a high impact from the U.S. operations, with 40 percentage points which impacted our results and the difference coming from other channels, broken down by channels and brands.
Our SG&A achieved BRL 432 million with the drop over gross revenue of 0.40 percentage points, which allows us to leverage our expenses over revenues in the period, leading to an EBITDA of BRL 152 million in the period, 22% year-over-year. Generating a leverage of 0.10 percentage points, which in turn converts a net income of BRL 63 million in the period compared to BRL 57,548 year-over-year, a 27% growth with a leverage of 0.2 percentage points year-over-year.
It's important to highlight that in the revenue, we're not including revenue from Vicenza that were acquired in the first quarter, but not having the closing yet. It's also important to highlight that these figures also include BRL 11 million in revenues from the Paris Texas operations in March. Just in March, we had the inclusion of the revenues in this financial statement.
This is the EBITDA and net income reconciliation. In the first quarter of 2022, BRL 65.6 million came from a credit, tax credit of PIS and COFINS that is non-recurring from previous years, which brings an increase of net income and EBITDA that's not recurring. This impact was present in 2022, and this brings the reconciled recurring numbers. Our distribution center expenses was already communicated in the past quarter that we would transition to our distribution center in Espírito Santo.
For some time, we have double logistics expenses to ensure the safe moving of our products and keeping our revenues at these levels. Also the adjustment of HG and corporation of the goodwill. With this, we conclude our net income and re-adjusted EBITDA. Our ROIC achieved 27.2% in the quarter. It's an important KPI analyzed by the company's management. I'd like to highlight two important points. First, related to suppliers. We had a drop in the volume, a reduction of 20 days on revenue days. This period, we had a strategic decision spearheaded by the company to support our suppliers in a moment in which the world and financials is higher all around the world. Azzas 2154 is careful with its franchisees and suppliers.
We made that decision. We have this one-off decision that will repeat itself in the next quarter. In the 3rd and 4th quarter of 2023, we will notice that it will go back to normal and resume to the levels of days of accounts payable, similar to what we saw in 2021 and 2022. Another important point is inventory. It's important to say that there was a change in the business model and adjustments of the company's volumes compared to other business models. We started with a more present industry. We went from 87% of non-proprietary sourcing to 82%. This increase of 7 percentage points in proprietary out-sourcing in shoes and handbags with the inclusion of HG and Sunset that brings many benefits for the company, especially developing handbags that the company didn't make.
Brings a different storage pattern and inventory, a more B2C model with a higher presence of online, in which the time of storing products is higher than B2B. Additionally, we're also have a pilot of inventory models for 2023. We would like to reiterate that the levels of inventory are very healthy and suitable, and we're constantly reviewing this metric and these volumes and adjusting the company to the reality of today's landscape. Our expectation for the next quarters is to progress to a profit close to what we saw in 2022 in terms of days of inventory. Now this makes sense for us.
On the next slide, we talk about our cash and debt position. Here, I'd like to point out non-operational items. BRL 199 million left cash for payments of acquisitions already communicated to our investors, and BRL 72 million, that's into payment of JCP for the company, interest over own equity. The debt of company would be around zero, but it is around BRL 6 million. These are the main points I'd like to address. Now I open for the Q&A. Thank you for your time.
Thank you, Sachete and Alexandre. We'll start our Q&A session. We have a lot of questions. I'll start with a question from BTG Pactual, a question that came from other analysts as well. Luis says, "Please could you comment on the state of the supply chain for Azzas 2154, and how you see the evolution of the account of suppliers and inventory in the next quarters?"
I'm going to start answering. Luis, thank you for your question. When I was asked a long time ago around the mission of Azzas 2154, and its mission is to take care of the health of their partners, be them franchisor-franchises or suppliers. During the pandemic, we showed our commitment to this principle. We didn't cancel any orders. We managed to expand payment terms for all of our franchises, and therefore maintained all of our suppliers with their financial health intact, as well as our franchises. Right now, in Q1 2023, with the increase of interest rates, some of our suppliers requested to advance payment.
We understood their situation. We decided, so to speak, take the consequence of it in our DRE to be which is more robust than our suppliers. We are totally aware it was the correct attitude in such an unstable moment for our suppliers. The trend of the scenario is to become normal. This was, everything will come back to normal. This is not defined as recurrent, we intend from summer purchases that we're going to receive in the second semester to go back to historical terms of payment. Rafael Sachete will continue with the answer.
Perfect, Alexandre. Thank you, Luis, for your question. I also explained a bit our ROIC, that's exactly it. There is an aspect of our care with o ur supply chain. To answer your question, the chain is solid and very well structured. The partnerships that Azzas 2154 has built in our supply chain are longstanding, and these suppliers are solid and strong financially on our side. We made a momentary decision of support while the world is more uncertain and with higher interest rates, and also with scarcity of credit for some companies.
As Alexandre mentioned, negotiations for the supply for the second semester already reflect the same levels that we saw last year and also in 2021 around the days for accounts payment that you should expect when you look at the next quarters, that from the third quarter we'll recover the same levels as the previous year. I think around inventory, I already brought the answer, but it's worth repeating that we're continuously looking for efficiency in our line of inventory.
We have structural changes, and more direct sales to the consumer through our own stores and e-commerce. We're looking, and surely will manage to bring higher levels of efficiency in inventory for the next quarters. Important to reinforce that this inventory is very high quality. It's an inventory that is present for our supply moments. There is no nothing to be mentioned here around the quality of this inventory. Thanks, guys.
Next question from Danny. She says, "The company reported a drop in volume of shoes and bags for yet another quarter. Does it make sense to think that this drop is more brought by the core brands, once Reserva and events must contribute positively for this growth? If so, what are you thinking around the strategy for growth of price versus volume?"
Danny, thank you for your question. I'd like to point out here a piece of data that is important for us. Although we're always, are measured our performance in a quarterly basis. In some moments and situations, it's interesting to analyze the numbers for the past 12 months. In the past 12 months, we had a growth of 7% in our volume of shoes and 18% in growth in bags. This said, you're right in your point that we face a new moment around what is the perceived value. Everybody must be aware of the high growth of luxury brands globally. The concern into offering the best cost-benefit ratio is our big model. It's not a matter of exactly a price if it's 100 or 110.
It is whether that BRL 110 will seem that it should be costing BRL 150, or if that BRL 100 means it should cost BRL 120. What we cannot have is the feeling that the client comes to the store and says, "It's expensive." This has not been happening. You're a customer of ours, and you must have friends that buy our brands, especially Arezzo brand. What we hear is that Arezzo can offer a great cost-benefit ratio. But we are increasingly improving our degree in fashion, our brand experience, and the quality of our raw material. Gradually, without frightening the clients, we've been managing to bring this added value to our consumer.
As a consequence of that, and not in general terms, when I look at e-commerce sales and in the main stores, they grow a lot in volume. However, as Brazil is very big with a big capillarity, some regions, maybe smaller multi-brand stores, it does not compensate to work with some of our brands. It is a strategic guideline that has been well thought through and structured. We don't intend to have a drop in volume. This 2% for shoes and 7% in bags, they should not go over that. They should actually must actually increase. Actually on bags, without explaining operations, but we've had a imported volume that was delayed due to problems with the IRS, and it was postponed the our invoicing for April.
60,000 bags is the volume, which is the delta volume that we had in Q1 2023. With that, we have a flat growth in the volume of bags compared to Q1. It's something we need to analyze, but it's worth pointing out that we work with fashion, added value, brand experience, so it doesn't justify the same kind of analysis for a supermarket or for a wholesaler where the price volume issue is black and white. Here we have added value, we have brand experience. What the, we don't want is that the client thinks it's expensive, though we are constantly monitoring this in the point of sale, that we do not have a lack of conversion in the end because the client didn't think the price was fair for them to make a good transaction.
Thanks, Alexandre. The next thing, a question from Juan from CD has sent and which is around international operation. They say margin was negative, and you mentioned that part of that was explained by the macro environment. How relevant it is today, the macro, for the performance of the operation? Which measures are you taking to revert this trend and improve margin?
Thanks for the question, Juan Cruz. I'm going to try to correct a bit what was said. In my opinion, the macro environment in the U.S. scenario or international scenario, it does not dictate anything around our business. When we refer to department stores that are concentrated sales, it's different than in Brazil that we have franchises that have two, three stores, 7,000 points of sale in multi-brand.
The sale of B2B in the U.S. or wholesale is done for just a few large retailers in department stores. They had an excess of purchase throughout 2022 due to the concern with lack of supply due to the effects of the pandemic. They reduced their purchases at the end of 2022, beginning of 2023. This is public data. There are some large players that are very consistent in their growth, but that announced at this period a reduction of sales to department stores. As we do not depend on that, so to your questions, we quickly started activating the growth of our DTC channels, especially e-commerce. We managed to surpass part of this reduction of purchase from department stores through e-commerce. Now we continue very proactively to invest in brand awareness and are going to open next week.
If you are in New York, you were invited on May 10th, in 1 week. We're going to open a very relevant store for Schutz branding on Broadway. It's a location with the highest traffic. For those who know, that between Spring and Prince Streets, we got the allowance for 6 months in rent and a rebate of 50% of the invested CapEx. It won't be a flagship of those that only generate image and do not generate bottom line. It is a store that actually is being projected to have a lot of profitability.
Also due to the fact that there is a large area, a basement area, we're going to use it as a fulfillment center for the whole e-commerce that is done in New York, especially in Manhattan, corresponding to around 10% of all of our e-commerce sales in the U.S. We're going to have dedicated freight and two-hour delivery. There are several measures that we're taking to set this or offset this reduction. Another relevant action will be the entry of the Arezzo brand in a partnership. Different from what I said, Macy's reduced the purchase of our brands to start with. Arezzo's going to be a launch that is going to be strong. 100 points of sale, 50 models in each store. We're talking about around 50,000 pairs of shoes.
Very strong and structured marketing investment being prepared for the launch of Arezzo with Macy's for their winter collection in the northern hemisphere on September. It's still a trial, but with good prospects of becoming good future growth. Around profitability that you mentioned, several measures have been taken. We on the, during the pandemic, had reduced expenses with people in the operation in the United States.
Throughout the past times, there has been a re-migration, so to speak, of people there. We mentioned that the most efficient model is to actually have operation in the sense of most transactions of CSC here in Brazil, more specifically in Campo Bom, where we're sitting now, where the cost of labor is cheaper than in São Paulo. We're in the process of migration and unifying the areas, always with focus in improving profitability.
We believe that for the next second quarter, we will have better results than the ones acquired in Q1 2023. Lastly, still around international, but now, outside of the U.S. and going to Europe. We've had some calls to discuss this MVP, so to speak, this beginning of strategic test of Arezzo&Co and putting all its know-how in the verticalized management of the value chain of the shoes business from the product create and prototyping and omni-distribution to emerging brands and having icon products, especially in Europe.
This strategy for investment of Paris Texas, an investment that we managed to accrue in the first month of revenue in our financial statement in March. In April, it maintained the same pace, around BRL 10 million-BRL 12 million revenue a month. We're going to leverage our sales in the European market, not only with the new brand, but also using the distribution channels that Paris Texas has to bring, especially the Alexandre Birman shoes brands. In the international area with international is very active. It's a strategic assumption of the company that throughout the years we're going to change our strategy with focus on our growth and profitability.
Still on international, Goldman Sachs has a question. Irma from Goldman Sachs. If we think that the brand's position, Arezzo, Schutz, and Alexandre Birman are suitable or if we have see any change.
They're still suitable. There was an inflation in the U.S. market, shoes market. We were able to offer an excellent value for money with small adjustments of 10% in Schutz. It operates with price below the two large players in target price. Our Broadway store will bring an average ticket of $180, which is very appealing for the product we offer. Those in New York, we will send an invite through one of our partners to go see the store, and we'll be there on May 10th. About Alexandre Birman, it's 20% below the most luxury known luxury brands, like Jimmy Choo at $600, and we think it's the right positioning.
Okay, the next question is from Pedro Pinto from Bradesco.
Strong and continuous performance in the past two years, the multi-brand that draws attention. Is there any relevant space on the number of doors that, entering preserving positioning? Do you have space to gain share of wallet? What brands do you see doing that?
The company was born multi-brand. It wasn't born as a retailer and then went to multi-brand. Since Arezzo was created in 1995 and Schutz in 95, we started selling at the trade shows, and we have a very strong tradition. I would like to invite you to be on São Paulo at the Bienal building. We have 1,000 multi-brand store owners.
You can see the passion and dedication and the pride they have in working with our brands. We have gains not only on doors, but a share of wallet of the retailers. About multi-brand that will bring strong revenue to Alexandre Birman is the Vicenza brand. We already have a strategy and generating great results, although it's not in our financial statements yet. It will be in June.
They have a great performance in the multi-brand, but it's still under its performance potential. Vans has a huge capillarity today, and we even have a limit for the brand to stay premium with high desirability. In handbags of Arezzo has the potential to grow in multi-brand. When you do a cross-sell between brand, channel, and product, it's continuous with many opportunities. We can see our forecast for the summer, and we will continue to show strong growth.
Next question is from Vinicius from UBS.
Could you comment about the drivers to invest working capital quarter? How Arezzo has been evolving with expansion of new categories? It also draws attention the strong performance of Vans. Could you comment more, what were the drivers for the brand to grow?
Perfect. Gonna start your question about Vans. I would like to invite our executive director that knows more about Vans, Rafael Sachete, will talk about Vans, and then I'll talk about your two other questions.
Talking about the brand's potential for expansion. Until 2022, it was operated by VF in Brazil. With the sub-penetration and also e-commerce and multi-brand, the strategy that we've been applying is to expand all these channels, generating the experience of brick-and-mortar stores with a very good pipeline to open new stores.
With excellent performance, we have two flagships in Brazil, one in Ipanema in Rio de Janeiro and another at Paulista in São Paulo. All the stores that are open, either own stores and franchise, have excellent performance. We have a pipeline of opening 20-25 new stores in the next 20 months in Vans. Additionally, for eCommerce, it changed through a resin code, BRL 1 million per month. We had strong revenues in Vans only in eCommerce. The presence of eCommerce hiring that we're just at the beginning. The eCommerce performs above average than other brands in the group, and activating new clients, activating base and stores that bring new clients to the base. The client profile for Vans is an omni-channel consumer.
They're younger, they either buy through the app or the brick-and-mortar store and gets it shipped to them, much higher than the average in the market. Multi-brand channel is very important. Split into different customer profile. Our presence is in large chains like Centauro, but also a strong presence in specialized stores for sneakers, surf wear, and skate wear. The brand strategy is to grow strongly in all channels, and the pipeline for this growth has a lot of room to evolve the brand in the next years and quarters.
About pricing. Our strategy historically is a cross plus. We develop our R&D in relation to all our products, so we know exactly the cost of raw material, time to produce each model, so we have a fixed cap. What we've been doing is working at improving the products' quality, raw material to offer an even more exclusive product. With a linear markup for our chain. We generate a price stability at the other end. Always surprising by the excellent value for money.
About the Reserva brands. The prices are stable. We have a basic T-shirt at BRL 129. It's a premium price, but we think it's a fair price. To go into the best price segment, we have an initiative for the Simples brand, where we already have BRL 1 million in eCommerce. We're gonna open the first store at Barra Shopping in the following months, entering the best price segment around BRL 69-70. Within Anacapri, we have also products for the B class.
We can offer products between BRL 99 and BRL 159 with excellent value for money. Our brand matrix generates experience and fair value for its product. It's very comprehensive. It goes from Anacapri to Alexandre Birman, which showed the highest growth in our own store channel in Brazil, achieving 65% with an average revenue of BRL 12 bi-million. They're small stores. They're 40 square meters with high yields.
We have two questions that are very similar. Guilherme from JP and something there about margin.
The EBITDA margin in Brazil was better than the SG&A after the first fourth quarter, making up for the drop in gross margin in operation year-over-year. Thinking about the dynamic exclusively in Brazil, what happened to the gross margin in 1Q '23?
If we can imagine that the EBITDA margin will be stable in the year or even expanding year-over-year. About the EBITDA margin. Running the risk of compromising, we can expect a leveraging of the EBITDA margin. All the efforts of the past months were analyzing projects and initiatives that were maturing. We chose to analyze carefully which of these initiatives would have a greater tenure and the company is focusing on its core. We have a leverage for the EBITDA margin for 2023. About gross margin that you mentioned. Half of that impact comes through reducing price in the U.S. operations to make up for the operations in the department stores. Also, it's not enough, I confess. We think that 0.5 basis points is not a reduction of gross margin.
That when you look at the diversity of brands, channels, products that we operate with in the first quarter, we also have the sales and promotions. It's not a change in pricers scenario. The gross margin is already reaching expectations in May, especially for our sell-out. Focusing on Mother's Day, our work, our homework is very well mapped to increase that margin.
This is our last question for today's call. It comes from Vinicius from Merrill Lynch.
How have you been seeing the performance in different initiatives in women apparel, and how can we think of evolving that category? Do you think that there's opportunity for more segments, and which ones still make sense?
Thank you, Vinicius. Thank you for your question. I'm gonna answer more comprehensively. As a platform, Azzas 2154 is very well-prepared. When we speak of brands, we see all the positive aspects, we analyze what could go wrong, when we join brands and management. It's not easy to operate in several systems, all the technology and logistics involved, we're very solid in our platform.
Within this scenario today, we have high interest rates, we will focus more on the brands that we have today for the next months in 2023. About your specific question of the women's apparel segment, our only acquisition was Carol Bassi that showed strong growth of 76% in the quarter. The customers love the brand, and they could sell high value-added products and customer loyalty that leave very high average tickets at Carol Bassi.
We're very happy, w e're gonna refurbish the store at Engenhão and create a showroom of the brand at the store, so it's an important investment that is in line with our goals, and it's a brand that generates a high EBITDA margin. About the inorganic initiatives, we have the Reversa, which is a branch from Reserva. It focuses greatly at the Leblon store. We had a store that has a very large, high legacy in Brazil that had exceptional results, so we're continuing with our test and improvement of products. About Schutz, we opened two independent stores, and we decided to try. The rollout of Schutz will be stores separate from apparel, and we created a hybrid model in which apparel would work as a product category in the same store. That was the decision we made.
The project is at the end of its preparation phase. We're gonna open the first store at JK Mall, with estimates of apparel to increase 20% in the same store. There is no growth in area, just a full change of the layout and the way that the products are displayed. If we look at the categories that stand out the most, jackets, tops. We're very confident that the store will generate revenue above 20% with a reasonable CapEx of BRL 10,000 per square meter. After this definite store, Schutz will be ready to grow in the women's apparel segment as a product category inside the Schutz store category. That's what we have for women's apparel.
That was our last question. Shirley, we can close.
I would like to thank you all for being here at our call. One hour sharp. Thank you for your attention and your trust. These 50 calls, many of you have been with us since the beginning. Despite all adversities, we have our culture that is highly adapted and quick and can feel the scenario and make decisions very effectively, focusing always in keeping our being perennial towards 2054. I hope you all go buy presents for your mothers at our Azzas 2154 stores, which is very important for our sell-out. Thank you. Thank you.