Uniqlo's yearly sales hit one trillion won

By Choi Sung-jin

Uniqlo, a Japanese clothing manufacturer and retailer, has become the first fashion brand in Korea to hit the annual sales landmark of 1 trillion won. 

According to company officials, Uniqlo's sales totaled 1.11 trillion won ($1 billion) in this business year (from Sept. 1, 2014 to Aug. 31, 2015), up 25 percent from last year. Its operating profit and net profit also rose 45 percent and 47 percent to 156.4 billion won and 119.4 billion won, respectively. 

The Japanese SPA (specialty retailer of private-label apparel), which began business here a decade ago, recorded annual sales of 895.4 billion won last year beating all other competitors. 

Uniqlo's functional clothing is popular among Korean consumers, including the heat retaining underwear brand, Heattech, made in conjunction with Japan's innovative clothing material maker, Toray. Even Zara, the world's No. 1 SPA, lags far behind the Japanese company in Korea, not to mention domestic brands, such as Bean Pole, K2 and Black Yak, whose annual sales hover around 700 billion won. 

Uniqlo's operator, Fast Retailing Group, is selling their products here through FRL Korea, a joint-venture marketing company it set up with Lotte Shopping at an equity ratio of 51 to 49. 

Industry watchers say Korean brands need to learn from the success of their Japanese competitors, such as their adherence to basics by turning out clothes made of performance fabrics, and low-cost marketing through establishing mass-production and a mass-distribution system.