The Portuguese footwear industry is committed to “quickly resuming and maintaining an upward trajectory of exports”, through a “surgical approach” to the markets, as the resources at its disposal “are not unlimited”. The industry’s new strategic plan, presented today, therefore identifies the 690 million people worldwide with an annual per capita income of $38,500 or more as a “potential market” for Portuguese footwear. They correspond to 9.1% of the world’s population, of which 30% in the United States and 21.6% in the European Union. China and Japan have only 11% and 7% of this target group respectively.
The USD 38,500, approximately EUR 37,000, corresponds to the average GDP per capita of the OECD countries in 2020. Once the potential target, which consists of “upper-class customers” in each country, is defined, the industry association will , the APICCAPS, sought to further tighten the mesh of what should be the industry’s international promotion efforts, identifying 145 cities with populations over 500 thousand that have high purchasing power and should be considered “priority opportunities ” for a sector that exports 95% of its production.
Nearly two-thirds are concentrated in Europe and North America, ranging from Montreal and Ottawa in Canada to Helsinki, Stockholm, Copenhagen or Oslo in Scandinavia. New York, Los Angeles, Dallas, Chicago or Atlanta are some of the examples of priority cities to consider in the US and in Europe Madrid, Barcelona, Paris, Lyon and Monaco, as well as London, Manchester, Liverpool, Dublin or Edinburgh . Berlin, Munich, Frankfurt and Hamburg, but also Milan, Rome and Vienna should not be forgotten.
Under the responsibility of the Center for Studies in Management and Applied Economics of the Católica Porto Business School, the new Strategic Plan of the Footwear Cluster 2030 is the seventh document of this type produced by APICCAPS. The first was in 1978, it should have appeared in 2020 without the pandemic. With four clear priorities, in terms of qualification, sustainability, flexibility and active presence in the markets, the new strategic vision for the next decade is split into 24 measures and 113 actions that aim to “reposition the sector in the international competitive scene” . . It envisages total investments of €600 million, of which €140 million are already underway, in the area of sustainability and with support from the Recovery and Resilience Plan.
New strategic plan represents a total investment of EUR 600 million, of which EUR 140 million is already being implemented under the PRR
In the document, to which DN/Dinheiro Vivo had access, the sector assumes that it wants to strengthen its position as one of the references in the international footwear market. “We don’t want Portuguese footwear to compete with the best, we want it to be one of the best. We don’t want to try to do as well as others, we want others to strive to do as well as we. . and creativity,” it reads.
“This plan is more than a vision, it is a commitment by the sector to deepen its competitiveness at the international level and continue to generate value for our country,” defends APICCAPS President Luís Onofre. The paper also presents five anchor projects – Digital Academy, Inclusion & Social Responsibility, Green Commitment, Demonstration Centers and Brand Entrepreneurship – areas of intervention considered “fundamental to the advancement” of the industry.
Made up of 1,500 companies, responsible for 40,000 jobs, it focuses on manufacturing in 172 countries and plans to prepare for a “new decade of growth” with this “strategic shock”. This year, and up to September, it sold 61 million pairs abroad, worth 1537 million, an increase of 22.5% compared to the same period last year.
And if it is true that the goal is for exports to “remain based on a national production base”, which, in addition to everything else, “promotes the industry’s reputation among consumers” and “provides sustainability benefits”, it is no less certain that the “labour shortage” is a problem that exacerbates production costs. And that is why the plan admits the need to “explore the possibilities of achieving efficiency gains in supply chains by resorting to international subcontracting, in whole or in part, from producers who can guarantee lower costs [de produção]🇧🇷
“It is important that Portuguese companies and footwear do not limit themselves to mere production activities and acquire managerial skills in international value chains,” reads the document, underlining that it is a path “in which most of our main European competitors go much further ahead”.
Ilídia Pinto is a journalist for Dinheiro Vivo
Source: DN
