Affected By The Epidemic, Mulberry Plans To Abolish 1/4 Of Its Staff Worldwide.

Mulberry, a luxury brand in Britain, announced on Monday that it plans to abolish 1/4 of the world's workforce by affecting the epidemic and is expected to affect 375 jobs.

At present, Mulberry has about 1400 employees worldwide, 1140 of whom are in the UK.

Mulberry said that the impact of the new crown virus epidemic on the company itself, the market economy and the overall demand for luxury goods is still unknown. The company hopes to temporarily cut expenditure through this initiative to ensure that future brand sales can gradually recover.

Mulberry stressed: "even if stores can be reopened, keeping safe social distance and decreasing the number of tourists will continue to affect our turnover. We need to ensure that the company can maintain a reasonable scale and operation mode in this difficult period to adapt to the market changes. So we offer a proposal to reduce the number of employees around the world by 25%.

The layoffs will be completed in the next 45 days, and Mulberry will contact the affected employees respectively. Thierry Andretta, the brand's chief executive, said: "we have taken prompt steps to cope with the impact of the new crown pneumonia, and will continue to implement a comprehensive and sustainable strategy to manage the capital so as to reduce operating costs and maintain liquidity.

Thierry Andretta said: "although we have industry-leading all channel platform and global operation network, closing all physical stores will have a significant impact on our sales. Layoffs are a very difficult decision for us, but we must deal with these challenging market conditions and maintain the future of the brand in the context of providing as many jobs as possible. "

At the same time, he added, "but there is no doubt that we have full confidence in Mulberry's brand strength and our long-term strategy."

The company has 120 stores in 25 countries around the world, but most stores have been closed due to the outbreak. At present, the brand has been reopened in some stores in China, Korea and Canada. It has also been operating on line channels all over the world. The brand said that the sales of online channels were good during the epidemic, but "this result can not completely offset the decline in demand from closing stores".

In addition to layoffs, the latest news released by the company also announced that its stores in the UK will be reopened in June 15th and expressed confidence in the crisis.