H&M to open 240 new stores in 2015

Swedish fashion retailer H&M plans to open 240 new stores in the fourth quarter, at the rate of three stores a day.

H&M

Among the earliest will be a new store in New Delhi, India, to be opened next week, and one in Cape Town, South Africa in October.In 2016, the retailer will enter three new markets New Zealand, Cyprus and Puerto Rico.
H&M is also continuing with the expansion of its online services to various countries. It will open an online store in Switzerland and Russia later this year, taking the number of online markets to 23.
E-commerce will be spread to nine more existing H&M markets, Ireland, Japan, Greece, Croatia, Slovenia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Luxembourg, next year.
The new concept H&M Beauty, launched in July, already has around 700 stores in 28 markets as well as online; it will be rolled out to 14 markets by the end of this year.
Announcing the quarterly results, H&M CEO Karl-Johan Persson said: “Our other brands are performing well and are continuing to reach out to more and more customers.
“For example, COS now has around 130 stores across 27 markets, Monki more than 90 stores in 13 markets, & Other Stories 25 stores in 10 markets and Weekday 20 stores in five markets.”
The group’s sales for the quarter increased by 19%, but profit remained the same as the last year.
Image: H&M to expand online service to various countries. Photo: courtesy of H&M.