Turkish shoemaker FLO has acquired the license rights to American shoe and fashion brand Nine West. It will now produce the brand for the local market and take over the Nine West stores as well.
Operating in the shoe industry as a subsidiary of Gözde Girişim and BİM, FLO Mağazacılık, one of Turkey' leading footwear chains, continues to grow with these newly added brands. The company has made its recent move with the acquisition of the world-famous U.S. shoe brand Nine West.
FLO obtained the license rights for Nine West to manufacture shoes designed by a special team in the U.S. as of Sept. 1 in Turkey. With this investment, Turkey will become the third country in the w
orld - after China and Brazil - to receive licenses from Nine West.
FLO Mağazacılık CEO Burak Övünç said the Nine West license rights would be taken over as of Sept. 1. "We will now undertake the collection and production of Nine West products that will be sold in Turkey. With Nine West, we look to offer more variety for modern and stylish women."
"In the first stage, we will take over the 10 Nine West stores in Turkey," he said, adding that they aim to increase the number of stores to 15 by the end of the year and to 50 within two years.
Övünç said they have established a special team for Nine West. "Twenty people work on this in our headquarters. This number will increase to 150 with store employees. We plan to work with more than 300 domestic producers in Turkey," Övünç said.
He also elaborated on FLO's growth in the first six-month period and future targets, recalling that they achieved a turnover of TL 2.1 billion with a growth of 30% in this period. He added that they aimed to reach TL 4.6 billion in turnover by the end of the year.
Explaining that they invested TL 50 million in the first six months, he said this number would reach TL 140 million by year-end, with investments made in IT, new stores and products.
"We have reached 554 stores in six months. We will open a total of 600 stores by the end of this year," he added.
He noted that they created 600 new jobs during this period and aimed to create 1,020 jobs by year-end. "With our second factory in Şanlıurfa, we created 1,500 jobs. We continue to grow in the Eastern European and African markets," Övünç said.
"We will enter nine new countries, including Morocco, Kenya, Nigeria, Qatar, Lebanon, Afghanistan, Montenegro, Bulgaria, and Romania. The number of stores abroad will reach 120 by the end of the year," he added.