Buying group MHK says it has remained resilient in the face of the economic crisis in Europe, with its retail partners seeing relatively flat sales figures over the past year.
At the buying group’s annual press conference in Germany, MHK Group said it had managed to “almost completely offset” the negative effects of the current market. The buying group said it was able to weather the difficult past financial year with its members experiencing only a slight decrease in sales amounting to less than 0.7%.
MHK’s retail partners reportedly generated total gross sales amounting to €9.66b (£8.25b), which it has attributed to an almost 10% increase in membership over the last year.
According to MHK, 2023 saw a record-breaking number of new partners joining the buying group. Over the course of the year, 356 new partners reportedly joined, with the number of retail partners totalling over 4,200 by the end of the year. MHK Group said that this is the single largest increase in membership in the company’s history.
Volker Klodwig, CEO of MHK, said that the buying group had made investing in its partners a priority during the recent period of economic difficulty. He said: “We have been able to cushion the acute consequences of a difficult economic environment, but above all we have empowered our members to take advantage of this phase.
“After all, consumer demand will return, benefitting the companies that have established a strong market position and who will be able to utilise their brand awareness to attract customers as well as having implemented efficient digital processes.”
Despite the current economic uncertainty, Klodwig is optimistic about the resilience of the industry going forwards. He explained: “Our project roadmap is well developed, and we are focused on growing even further. We demonstrated this in 2023 with our intimate knowledge of our retailers, our unique service portfolio, and our innovation pipeline whose target focus is always the benefit for our partners.”
MHK UK’s sales manager, David Morris, recently urged retailers to bolster their online presence to survive the current period of economic turmoil.