Hello. It's Graham Renwick from Berenberg. Of the EUR 2 billion sales target that you have, how much of that is organic growth of the current brand portfolio versus winning new licenses versus M&A? Do you see any strategic value in taking lens production In-House? I know Luxottica talks a lot about the complete pair and the advantages of being able to widen the prescription eyewear assortment by having control of both supply chains.
I didn't hear the second part of the question. What was the second part?
Taking lens production In-House. Is there any strategic value in
Lens production, you're saying?
Yes. Yeah.
Okay. Organic growth versus the acquisition. I think as I said before, our main goal is still to grow the brands that we have in the portfolio and the brands that belong to our shareholder. I think that the potential average growth rate of those brands will be about between 6% and 8%, while the new brands will contribute substantially in terms of future growth, and they will be around 10%-12%.
Overall, we will always keep an eye in making sure that our mix is gonna be about 60% on our house brands and 40% on the brands that we have acquired. Lens production, that's an interesting question.
We have a different business model from Luxottica, but we keep an eye on vertical integration if the opportunity may arise in terms of what our partners do. Of course, we have partners. You remember, from the very, very beginning, we decided to create Kering Eyewear remaining flexible in terms of production.
What I mean by that is that we really wanted to have a network of partner which were the best in their specific field of expertise, so the best guy in acetate, the best guy in metal, the best guy in lenses, the best guy in cases. Now, we've seen other companies doing acquisition upstream, and of course, we have two big company to transition and integrate, so our focus will be really there because believe me, it's very complex.
Roberto, our chief operating officer, is also in charge of the transition team at Lindberg, and, you know, we have stream projects, things that needs to be done. The timing in which they need to be done is quite intense, also because we work a little bit in a different way compared to these guys. If the opportunity will come, I know that I can call François-Henri, go into his office, speak to Jean-François and Jean-Marc Duplaix, and for sure we will potentially be ready. Lenses, of course, it is 1 of the topics.
Luca Solca from Bernstein. Good morning, Roberto. I wonder if you could give us a bit more detail, looking under the bonnet of the machine you've built, about frames and the mix in technologies you have, when you look at metal, acetate, injected plastic, Titanium or anything, and how this could change after you integrate Lindberg and quite possibly Maui Jim as soon as you have closing on that.
And when it comes to producing those frames, do I understand correctly that internal production is now focused on metal? And do you plan to expand your internal manufacturing capability of frames to other technologies as well?
Okay. Thank you, Luca. I think this is also a very interesting question, and consider that Lindberg is produced completely internally, and it's all Titanium, so somehow it goes into the metal side of the world.
Maui Jim is produced precisely with the same business model that we have for our own brands, and actually they have some of their partners in production that are our own partners, so there's gonna be a lot of synergies there. Because I want you to start to know some of my colleagues, I pass on for more details this question to Roberto.
Working? Yeah. Can you hear me? Yes. Yeah. I think that's an interesting question. In reality today, we are having an internal production of acetate as well, so the Trenti plant basically is more skewed to the acetate production. Basically, internally, we have manufacturing Kering Eyewear, mostly metal, noble material, wood, horn.
We have Lindberg, 100% Titanium. We have Trenti, which is, I would say, a huge production facility. We are talking about 1 million point something frames per year, which is 85% acetate. Basically, when we talk about technologies, we have a bit of everything. Maui Jim will be, when and if we close, basically injection and acetate, mostly injection. We will add the injection technology, which today we have only partially in our actual product portfolio.
Basically, we have quite a complete range of technology under our direct control. That said, we are very closely monitoring the evolution of our supply chain, and we cannot exclude that maybe in the next future we will have some you know interest in additional manufacturing capacity. What is important for you to know, we are not willing to have a full internalized production.
We strongly believe our strategy should be sticking true to our initial strategy, which is basically having flexibility. As you were maybe mentioning in your question, the market trend can change quite dramatically.
When you talk about metal acetate, do not forget that most of the frames sometimes are a combination of the two technologies, and, it's very difficult to find under a unique row the whole technologies available. We want to be very flexible and, following the market trends without being too rigid on the cost base and investment side. It's okay? Thank you.
Yeah. I only add to that, we also have a very interesting agreement, production agreement with Safilo, which we have renewed, as you know. It is interesting that when Safilo lost some of their licenses pertaining to the other luxury group, they came to us and they said, "We have capacity, guys. What do you wanna do? You like to stay with us? So we're happy about the service, we're happy about the quality," and as Jean-Marc said, we did a good negotiation, and so we're still with them. Yeah.
Roberto, it's Flavio Cereda from Jefferies. I have 3 quick questions. Number 1, can you explain the Lindberg story? Because I suspect it's not just a question of you wanting to buy Lindberg, but Lindberg choosing you at the same time, because we know that, I mean, Luxottica has been trying to buy Lindberg for what, 15 years, right?
Never succeeded, and you did. Is it because of your positioning? Is it because you were ring-fencing the name, you were giving certain guarantees that probably the other people were not going to give? My second question is kind of related to what Luca asked. If you look at the 1 of the challenges of getting to a certain size is complexity of the offer, right?
I was just wondering on some, let's say on the Gucci collection, the depth of the SKUs compared to what Safilo was doing when it was a license and you were running the company there, how has that changed, and how is that gonna become a challenge going forward? Number 3, your personal opinion on the space overall, sector trends.
You have the luxury brands who have an eyewear either through a license or through yourselves. You have standalone specific brands like a Lindberg. But a lot of the other brands that are eyewear only are more fashion, crash and burn. I'm thinking, you know, Gentle Monster, these people are not doing too well these days. What do you think is the evolution of the luxury space going forward?
Okay.
Thank you.
I start with the Lindberg story. Thank you, Flavio. As Henrik said, because 1 of these digital event that we did, it was a double interview, Henrik and myself, I don't take no as an answer, so that's the reason why we bought Lindberg. Seriously, I wanted to buy Lindberg 15 years ago, I didn't have the money.
Remember what I said before, first time I see François-Henri in his office, he's wearing a pair of Lindberg. You know, I start thinking about Lindberg from the very beginning, and the moment in which François-Henri started to tell me, "Now we have the possibility to do some acquisition, what would you do?" I immediately thought about Lindberg.
It has been a long period of time in which every trade fair, every time I saw Henrik, I was going to see him and say, "Henrik, what do you want to do?" You're right, Andrea Guerra told me that they tried 7, 8, 9 times. It was Leonardo Del Vecchio's dream to buy Lindberg, and they never succeeded. Why did they decide to go with us?
First of all, I organized a lunch between Henrik and François-Henri in Milan during MIDO, and they immediately liked each other. As Henrik said, he wanted to leave his company to someone that could have really enhanced further his concept of design, technology, high-end product to make the best pair of frames available in the market for people that needed to see better.
In fact, when together with his fathers, he started to look at the way Lindberg is done, and please go and take a look from close to the Lindberg that we have down there, their point was, people are wearing frames, like you and I, Flavio 16 hours a day.
How can I make sure that they feel comfortable with them, that they don't even feel that they have them, but they can still see very well? The moment in which I created Kering Eyewear with Kering, I started to have more intense conversation with Henrik. I started to feel that he liked what we were doing. He liked being part of a luxury group.
He liked the fact that Kering was empowering imagination of the people working for the different brands, and was giving freedom without a frame in the sense that we could have done something very nice for his brand.
Again, the guy is still very young and he said, "You know, I'm always gonna be around if you need us, me." It was a tough decision, but that is the reason why he decided to go with us and nobody else. He told that to all of his employee in the video that he had prepared for them, the moment in which we close. He said, "I like Kering. I like what Kering Eyewear is doing. Roberto convinced me that this is the right choice.
I think that you guys in my company are in safe hand. That is, I think, I hope it answer the first question. Remind me the second 1, Flavio.
The risk as you get to a certain size of complexity, and therefore the depth of the SKUs for the bigger collection.
Yes, yes.
compared to previously.
Again, here I think that the best answer can come from sales, so I'll give it to Omar for that 1. By the way, I start by saying that we more than double the size of Gucci eyewear since we took over, and it was already very substantial back then when we took over from the previous licensee.
Good morning. Yeah. The depth of Gucci, for example, is much bigger than what it was. That's enough time to answer the question specifically. There is a reason why. 1 of the reason behind the success of Kering Eyewear is that we from the beginning have decided to tailor-made the offer to each and every customer in the world.
We need to be very specific in what we offer and when we offer it. To give you an example, within the Gucci eyewear collection, you have a huge offering for the Asian consumer, which is very different from what you offer to the Western consumer because of the weight, because of the fitting, because of the taste, because of the color, because of the lenses.
This offers a huge opportunity for us to be strong in each and every market. Complexity, yes, but that's how we can be present and successful in each and every market and with each and every channel where we serve our customers. Of course, we still have opportunities to grow the collection, because in terms of demand offering, we can do even more. In terms of the optical collection, we can do even more. Yes, it is a complexity, but it's a huge opportunity for us to grow.
Thank you, Omar. Remember, specifically in the case of some of our brands, Gucci, but also Balenciaga, Saint Laurent, we have an excellent relationship of all of these guys by definition, but the relationship has grown over the years, and the numbers we are doing are unbelievable compared to where we started.
The main point is that they have really integrated eyewear in everything they do. If you see Alessandro Michele in the shows or Demna, what he does on the shows, you see a lot of sunglasses frames, and that is very important for our creativity and to make sure that we have a broad collection with a good mix of carryover, which is always there, and novelties. The third question that you had, Flavio, was what I think over broadly about the industry and the sector.
You mentioned Gentle Monster, those guys. My view there is quite strong in the sense that, I think you need size. If you don't have size, you can go up and then you go down very quickly. Again, I don't want to mention specific names, but I've seen all of these independent eyewear brands. None of them has really done well recently, and I think that the only 1 that was really big, very successful and profitable, but it was done 47 years ago, was Maui Jim. Those others, are we interested? I'm not so sure.
Luca Solca from Bernstein again. Thank you for giving me a second question. From my experience in the industry, 1 of the most difficult things when you manage an eyewear company is to keep inventory under control because the planning process, given the amount of SKUs and the short life cycle of these products, is very complex.
I'm very keen to understand how you manage this planning process and inventory engagement, whether you collect orders and then you produce, or how much you risk production in the first place. Thank you very much indeed.
Thank you, Luca. This is my preferred topic with Jean-François. To be honest, because he has been from the very beginning every monthly asking us, and things have gone much better recently, right, Jean-François? I give it to Roberto because...
Again, a very interesting question. First of all, it's worth noting that if you take 100% of our business, we have around 40% make-to-order excluding Lindberg. Lindberg 100% make-to-order. We have 40% make-to-order, 60% make-to-stock. With regards to the make-to-order part, clearly we have a much easier view of what will come out and what we need, so it's easier to forecast the production.
Generally, we have no stock risk there. When we talk about the 60% make-to-stock, clearly there is a process, and I would say that our major strength is the fact that we develop the collection in a shorter lead time.
We are able to present this collection in a sort of preview from our customers, and that's the main strength that gives us timing to plan. Clearly, we have as well focusing on a specific I would call key performance styles, core assortment, let's call the way you like it.
We focus on a specific assortment to be produced for stock, and this is where our commercial people can fish to feed the orders. We have clearly you know on the iPad in our electronic systems, they can see the available stock. 1 of the challenges, and I would say the opportunities we always discuss internally, is what is the percentage of orders taken on available stock.
This is a very important KPI for us, and that gives us the possibility to manage, I would say, even better than expected, our stock levels. I would say that we are, if you look at the trend of the net sales, you would expect a much growing inventory, which is not the case in our situation. We are keeping the stock very tight. Sometimes if we talk to our commercial team, too tight.
It's always a question of balancing, you know, the expectation that we have commercially with the production capacity. I think so far we can be very satisfied of the job we are doing. Clearly, it's as you were saying, maybe the biggest challenge in our world.
Together with the fact that we have, as Omar was explaining, a very huge offer on certain brands of collection because clearly we are customer-focused. At the same time, we are very careful while introducing newness in taking out the slow movers from our collections, and that gives us another tool to adequately manage the stock levels.
Luca, to your point, this is really a hot topic. From our previous life, I like to say that altogether, because we all come from the eyewear industry, as you know, we have 600 years of experience in eyewear. We were very careful from the very beginning to make sure that this was an aspect that was managed perfectly because it makes or breaks the profitability of an eyewear company, given the number of SKUs and the depth of the collections.
If I may add, another specificity. I think, another winning decision was the fact of having a big, unique warehouse because this gives us the possibility to better control the stock. Clearly, we have another warehouse in U.S.
just for the Treos customers that have to be served in 24 hours. Having a unique pool of warehouse and the stock gives us, you know, the efficiency that we need to serve the customer in the right time without having a possible or potential overstock if you spread the number of warehouses around the globe.
Yes. Good morning. Antoine Belge from BNP Paribas Exane. Two questions, probably 1 for Roberto and maybe 1 more for François-Henri. Regarding the two acquisitions that you recently made, can you comment about their profitability characteristics maybe versus, you know, the average of the division before you acquired these two brands? I think the synergies, especially in terms of distribution, are quite obvious.
That should lead you to the 13% margin. Do you need to do a short-term investment that could result in a sort of a hockey stick type of margin progression? The second question is, so you've been extremely successful in eyewear. There is another business which has some similarities, which is perfumes.
I mean, is this giving ideas maybe at the group level to replicate the success you had in eyewear into the perfume business?
I start.
The first 1. The second 1 we will answer tonight if you agree, Jean-François.
Yeah. Second 1 will be Q&A management.
Okay.
Keep me in mind.
Okay. Thank you for your question. As I mentioned, both the companies that we bought are extremely well-run and very profitable. Of course they will be accretive to the overall profitability of Kering Eyewear in a substantial way. That's why the ambition is to be well above 15%, and is also what François-Henri asks me every time I see him. In terms of investment to make sure that we get to the growth that we are projecting, yes, we will need to do to make investment, particularly short term.
If you think about, for example, Lindberg in terms of manufacturing capacity, of course, Henrik kept the company at around EUR 100 million, very happy they are making a lot of money, saying, "Guys, we don't bother to go over those, that number. People are asking us to get our frames.
Who cares? We're happy. We're making a lot of money." It's not the way we work. We never give up, you remember I said before, so we try to do always better. Therefore, in order to make sure that we have the revenues, we need to increase production capacity, and that is where we are investing money at the moment, as well as in terms of brand recognition and brand awareness. We wanted to be closer to the final consumer in terms of knowledge of Lindberg.
At the moment is a specialist brand. All opticians in the world, they know it very well. We like also consumer to know it a little bit better, so we will have also some investment into marketing and communication.
Maui Jim, once we close, and we hopefully, I say it again, close end of September, will be a little bit of a similar story because we will certainly rationalize the part in of the supply chain in terms of particularly laboratories. As I said, there is a huge potential to expand internationally in terms of revenues, but also in terms of product category.
Because once you have a lab, and we wanted to have a lab for a number of years now, particularly in the U.S. where opticians are used to have the job completed, as they say, we will need to increase the capacity in doing jobs also for our brands. That lab in the U.S. will do Americas, from Canada to Latin America. We also have a lab in Germany, which is state-of-the-art with all new machinery.
We will need to serve the additional request that we will have for Maui Jim in Europe, in Asia Pacific, and for those lenses into our brands. Again, the two companies are very profitable. We want to keep up the profitability, possibly improving it. Overall, very accretive to Kering Eyewear profitability. I hope that answered the question.
Hi, I'm Thomas Chauvet from Citi. Two questions for you, Roberto. The first 1, can you talk about the opportunities to sign some agreements to licensing agreements with other brands outside of the Kering and Richemont groups, particularly fashion brands? How difficult is it gonna be given obviously Kering Eyewear is controlled by a fashion company, Kering, and what are your criteria for thinking about other licensing opportunities?
Secondly, Richemont is a significant shareholder in Kering Eyewear. Historically, Kering has never been a big fan to have minority investors at some of its business. What's different here? What do they bring to the table beyond obviously the manufacturing assets of Cartier, and how do you collaborate on a day-to-day basis? Thank you.
Okay. Thank you. First question, the answer is no, because and François-Henri has many people calling him with brands asking him, "Should we do eyewear?" The two of us, when we get together, we say, "Okay, let's have a call. Let's have a meeting." Our strategy is that we make eyewear only for the brands of our shareholders, so Kering and Richemont.
I think we have enough on our plate, huge opportunities to improve what we are doing with our own brands. We receive a lot of request, and you could imagine the most various range of luxury fashion brands. No, we need to stay focused. We need to do better on what we have, and there is a lot to do, so we have no intention to do brands of.
to make eyewear for other brands outside Kering and Richemont. The question on Richemont. It all started because I really wanted to do Cartier. Even in my previous life, I went to see Richard Lepeu at the time, and I said to Richard, "We can do better than you in the eyewear." Of course, for Cartier, eyewear and perfumes were ancillary to the core categories.
The moment in which I was finally at Kering, they said, "Yes, we can do it. We like the model. We like the internalization. We're never gonna give a license on Cartier ever, so let's do it together." What do they bring? They bring certainly support. They bring certainly an excellent relationship in terms of teamwork.
I think we have 1 of the smoothest relationship ever with Cartier, and they're very supportive also from an economic investment point of view, the moment in which we need to spend a little bit more in terms of marketing, advertising, communication. Of course, they bring the other brands in their portfolio to the table. I would say that it is an excellent relationship.
By the way, we propose to them the fact. We talked to them about Lindberg. They were supportive. We talked to them about Maui Jim. They said the best brand ever. Even Johann Rupert loved the brand because he plays golf and he uses it. There is an excellent relationship. We work well together, and we're happy that way. Yeah.
No, I think we have to stop now. Sorry.
Okay.
on time. Yeah.
Thank you again, everyone. Appreciate your patience.