Photo/Illutration Tadashi Yanai, chairman and president of Fast Retailing Co., speaks at a news conference in Tokyo on April 13. (Yoko Masuda)

The head of Fast Retailing Co., which operates the popular Uniqlo clothing store chain, is setting his sights high for the company by vowing to achieve 10 trillion yen ($75 billion) in sales in the next 10 years.

Tadashi Yanai, the company’s president, said at a news conference held over the firm’s interim results on April 13 that Fast Retailing aims to expand sales in three regions: China, Hong Kong and Taiwan; Southeast Asia; and North America and Europe.

And he wants those markets to eclipse domestic sales in the next five years.

“In the company’s growth process in the past 20 years, our sales grew threefold every 10 years or so,” Yanai said at the news conference. “We aim to grow more than threefold in the next 10 years, too, to achieve the 10 trillion sales (target).”

Uniqlo is already concentrated in the Chinese market with 925 stores there as of the end of February--more than its number in Japan. But the brand is also quickly becoming better known in other markets, so the company has decided to expedite its plans to open stores elsewhere, Yanai said.

If Fast Retailing’s sales can reach that 10-trillion mark, that would make it as large as the telecommunications giant Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp. (NTT) or major electrical equipment company Hitachi Ltd.

In the retail industry, 7-Eleven convenience store operator Seven & i Holdings Co. had only just announced on April 6 that its revenue exceeded 10 trillion yen for the first time in the financial year ending in February 2023.

Fast Retailing announced on April 13 brisk interim results for the six months ending in February 2023, with the company notching record sales of 1.46 trillion yen--up 20.4 percent year on year.

Helped by its strong performance in Southeast Asia, North America and Europe, Uniqlo’s overseas business made up 51.5 percent of the company’s sales, according to the earnings report.

It also smashed its own records for operating profit and net profit for the second consecutive year.

Operating profit was 220.2 billion yen, up 16.4 percent year on year, while net profit was 153.3 billion yen, 4.5 percent more than the same period last year.

(This article was written by Yoko Masuda and Yuji Yamashita.) 

Related News