Luxury doesn’t look the same as it has for so many years.
Today, luxury means more than traditional fashion houses and unseemly markups—and it also means high value rather than just high price.
That’s why, for the first time, Canada Goose topped the list of Deloitte’s Fastest 20, a ranking of luxury brands based on their compound annual growth rate of sales over a two-year period.
The Canadian premium outdoor and performance apparel brand, best known for its luxury jackets with a lifetime warranty, saw sales jump 63 percent in fiscal 2016, the period Deloitte surveyed for its recently released Global Powers of Luxury Goods 2018 report. Its growth in sales was 36 percent over the two years to 2016, with sales reaching $307 million.
In its own financial report released Friday, Canada Goose said for fiscal 2018 ended March 31, total revenue jumped 46.4% to 591.2 million Canadian dollars ($443.7 million). Direct-to-consumer revenue in particular, increased 121.3% to 255 million Canadian dollars ($191.4 million), representing 43 percent of its total revenue. For the coming fiscal year, the company expects revenue growth of at least 20 percent.
“Our execution in fiscal 2018 was exceptional across all growth strategies and key metrics,” Canada Goose president and CEO Dani Reiss said. “These results reinforce my belief that we are still just scratching the surface of our global potential.”
Looking at the Fastest 20 as a whole, Canada Goose’s growth rate was more than double the 15.1% average among its peers—and even that 15.1% was nearly four times the growth rate for the top 100 luxury companies overall, Deloitte noted.
In keeping with the rise of outdoor brands in luxury, Moncler also made the top 20 list, ranking seventh with a 22.4% growth rate, and bringing in $1.15 billion in sales in the two years through fiscal 2016.
When it comes to clothing and footwear, which was the strongest product sector in the Fastest 20, Valentino, SMCP (the parent company for Sandro, Maje and Claudie Pierlot), Acne Studios, Ted Baker, Dolce & Gabbana and Brunello Cucinelli made the list. Kering was also counted among the Fastest 20 for the first time, likely due at least in part to Gucci’s sizeable sales success.
Other long-standing luxury brands, however, slipped from the ranks.
“For the first time in four years, previous leaders Kate Spade and Michael Kors dropped out of the Fastest 20 list,” Deloitte noted. “Kate Spade only just dialed to make the grade, achieving 22nd place, but Michael Kors’ FY2016 sales declined.”