BIRKENSTOCK APPOINTS NEW MANAGING DIRECTOR FOR GREATER CHINA: TIFFANY WU TO LEAD AND TO ACCELERATE THE COMPANY’S EXPANSION IN THE GROWTH REGION WITH THE LARGEST UNTAPPED WHITE SPACE POTENTIAL
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LINZ AM RHEIN/SHANGHAI (ots)
BIRKENSTOCK has appointed Tiffany Wu as Managing Director Greater China, effective November 1, 2023. In this newly created position, Wu will lead the Greater China business area, which includes mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, driving brand equity and sales in the region. She reports to Klaus Baumann, Chief Sales Officer of the BIRKENSTOCK Group.
With the new appointment the Germany-based revered global zeitgeist and purpose brand aims to further strengthen the company’s expanding footprint in the most dynamic region in Asia Pacific and the growth region with the largest untapped white space potential for the company, alongside India and Japan. Today, BIRKENSTOCK operates a rapidly growing e-commerce business in China, which will be supplemented by a strong owned retail presence and a healthy wholesale business with select local partners.
Oliver Reichert, Director of Birkenstock Holding plc and Chief Executive Officer of the BIRKENSTOCK Group: “Greater China is the strongest growth driver for us in the APMA region alongside India and Japan. Unlike many other brands, we haven't faced consumer headwinds in the last months, quite the opposite. And in view of the latest economic outlook, we expect this positive trend to continue or accelerate. This is supported by the business in our own digital channels which has developed extremely positively in China this year. With the additional capacity that we can allocate since the go-live of our new plant in Pasewalk in September 2023, we now have the bandwidth to satisfy Chinese consumers' appetite for our products. In the past three years we have started to implement our engineered distribution playbook in the region. We are now ready to take the next step in our growth journey. It's the perfect moment for Tiffany Wu to join the team. Welcome aboard!”
WELL-ROUNDED AND PASSIONATE LEADER WITH PREMIUM FASHION AND LUXURY EXPERTISE
Wu is a well-rounded and passionate leader. With over 18 years of premium fashion and luxury end-to-end omni-channel expertise in China and acute brand sense, Wu is an expert in driving brands’ commercial strategy, omni channel expansion, brand building and storytelling through China’s ever-changing digital landscape along with a strong marketing and PR foundation.
After living in New York, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, and China, Wu studied at the University of California-Irvine, and spent the final year of her Bachelor studies at Peking University. It was there that she was recruited by the PR agency Ogilvy. After three years with the global PR firm, in 2009 she co-founded a leather goods designer brand called Heirloom and successfully sold it ten years later, when the brand was present in 11 countries.
From 2019 onwards, Tiffany Wu led the Fung Retailing-Asia Retail Company (ARC), which assisted foreign companies in the Chinese market. In 2021, she took on the role of managing the Greater China region (China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Macau) for Blue Nile, the world's largest online diamond sales company.
As a compassionate brand expert, who likes to create things from the ground up, Wu embraces her new career step: “BIRKENSTOCK’s growth potential is enormous in this market. In fact, the current timing is very favorable for our brand, because since Covid, the Chinese have become more health-conscious, and young people want to protect the environment. Our products meet these expectations perfectly.
As we ramp up our production capacity, we will unlock the large growth potential of China and the whole APMA region, which has generated significant latent demand that we have been unable to fulfill in recent years given more limited supply. Our targeted growth strategies will build upon our growing popularity in the region’s underdeveloped markets, including China, where our brand is nascent.”
CAUTIONARY STATEMENT REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS
Certain statements in this press release may constitute “forward-looking” statements and information within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, and the safe harbor provisions of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such forward-looking statements relate to our current expectations and views of future events, including our current views with respect to, among other things, our operations, financial performance and growth in the Asia Pacific region. Forward-looking statements include all statements that do not relate to matters of historical fact. In some cases, you can identify these forward-looking statements by the use of words such as “anticipate,” “believe,” “could,” “expect,” “should,” “plan,” “intend,” “estimate” and “potential,” “aim,” “anticipate,” “assume,” “believe,” “continue,” “could,” “estimate,” “expect,” “forecast,” “guidance,” “intend,” “may,” “ongoing,” “plan,” “potential,” “predict,” “project,” “seek,” “should,” “target,” “will,” “would” or similar words or phrases, or the negatives of those words or phrases. The forward-looking statements contained in this press release are based on our management’s current expectations and are not guarantees of future performance. Forward-looking statements are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors and are based on potentially inaccurate assumptions that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expected or implied by the forward-looking statements. Our actual results could differ materially from those expected in our forward-looking statements for many reasons, including the factors described in the sections titled “Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Statements” and “Risk Factors” in Birkenstock Holding plc’s Prospectus filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission pursuant to Rule 424(b) on October 12, 2023. Any forward-looking statement made by us in this press release speaks only as of the date of this press release and is expressly qualified in its entirety by the cautionary statements included in this press release. We undertake no obligation to publicly update or review any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future developments, or otherwise, except as required by law.
PRESS INQUIRIES
Birkenstock Group B.V. & Co. KG
Burg Ockenfels
53545 Linz am Rhein
Germany
Postal address:
BIRKENSTOCK Group
Lenbach Palais
Lenbachplatz 3
80333 Munich
Germany
ABOUT BIRKENSTOCK
BIRKENSTOCK is a global brand which embraces all consumers regardless of geography, gender, age and income and which is committed to a clear purpose - maintaining foot health. Deeply rooted in studies of the biomechanics of the human foot and footed on a family tradition of shoemaking that can be traced back to 1774, BIRKENSTOCK is a timeless “super brand” with a brand universe that transcends product categories and ranges from entry-level to luxury price points while addressing the growing need for a conscious and active lifestyle. Function, quality, and tradition are the core values of the lifestyle brand which features products in the footwear, sleep system, and natural cosmetics segments. BIRKENSTOCK is the inventor of the footbed and has shaped the principle of walking as intended by nature (“Naturgewolltes Gehen”).
With around 6,200 employees worldwide, we believe how things are made matters as much as the product itself. To ensure these quality standards, we operate a vertically integrated manufacturing base and produce all our footbeds in Germany. In addition, we assemble over 95% of our products in Germany and we source over 90% of our materials and components from Europe. We process our inputs to the highest environmental and social standards in the industry by operating state-of-the-art scientific laboratories for materials testing.
In Germany, BIRKENSTOCK runs operational sites in the states of North Rhine-Westphalia, Rhineland-Palatinate, Hesse, Bavaria, Saxony, and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania Headquartered in Linz am Rhein, the BIRKENSTOCK Group also operates its own sales offices in the United States and Canada as well as in Brazil, Japan, Denmark, Poland, Switzerland, Sweden, Spain, the United Kingdom, France, Norway, [the Netherlands,] Dubai, Singapore and India.
Birkenstock Group B.V. & Co. KG
Contact:
Jochen Gutzy
Chief Communications Officer
+49 (0)170 920 6559
jgutzy@birkenstock-group.com
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