„COVID-19 has negatively impacted our business since the beginning of February both in terms of sales and sourcing,” the company said in a statement.
„All our offices around the world are open. The office in Shanghai re-opened after the officially extended holiday period for Chinese New Year. In all our facilities, we are taking precautionary measures. We have asked all employees who are in or have been to any of the officially defined risk areas to work from home for a period of two weeks,” it reads.
Impact on Sourcing
China accounts for less than 20% of PUMA’s international sourcing volume, while factories outside China have not been impacted. According to the company, within China, all of the Tier 1 (finished product) supplier factories are open again and are operating at 80%-100% of capacity, while almost all of the Tier 2 (material) factories are also up and running. The outbound logistics are „largely in operation with all sea ports now open, therefore, our global supply chain is currently not at risk apart from minor delays.”
Impact on Sales
In China, where most of PUMA’s owned as well as partner stores were temporarily closed in February, sales have been severely affected. „There are now early signs of improvement. Most of our stores in China and those of our partners are now open again. Traffic that had initially been extremely low picked up over the weekend,” the company said. Other Asian markets such as Singapore, Malaysia, Japan and South Korea, which typically benefit from Chinese tourists, continue to see heavy negative effects on sales.
Despite the spread of COVID-19 in Europe, almost all of PUMA’s stores are still open, excepting those in Northern Italy which operate under reduced opening hours. „Across Europe, we register significantly lower footfall traffic,” PUMA announced.
