Inditex to launch budget chain Lefties in key European markets; UK, France to be included
Home › News › Retail Download
Print
Lefties, the budget fashion chain operated by Spanish giant Inditex since 1999, is about to embark on an ambitious European expansion plan. Lefties is positioned in the entry-level price segment, having originally been an inventory clearance retailer for Inditex's Zara chain, and is set to take its first steps in several key European markets next year, as reported by Spanish fashion news outlet Modaes. Lefties
In France, it will debut in an as yet unspecified city, as well as in the UK, Germany and the Netherlands. Contacted by FashionNetwork.com, the Inditex group's French management did not wish to comment on the news.
Lefties has a strong presence in Spain and Portugal, and currently operates a chain of approximately 200 stores across 18 markets worldwide. Including notably the Middle East, where in recent years it made a breakthrough in countries like Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait and Oman.
Lefties sells ready-to-wear, underwear, accessories and footwear for women, men and children. It recently also introduced home decoration, to acquire more of a lifestyle aura. Lefties is positioned in a market segment where chains like Primark and Zeeman are currently thriving, and has recently been veering towards higher-quality products and a more defined style. Prices range from €10 for a top to €13 for a pair of shorts and €22 for a dress.In March, although not yet present in France, Lefties dropped a collaboration with Paris Saint-Germain football club, a menswear capsule collection with a distinctive urban-contemporary style. A Lefties store in Barcelona, Spain - Shutterstock
Lefties isn't yet treated as a separate entity within the Inditex group's financial reporting. In the last five years, its annual sales are said to have doubled to reach nearly €600 million in fiscal 2023-24, according to Modes.
Inditex, led by Marta Ortega, recorded a 7.5% revenue growth in the last fiscal year, reaching €38.632 billion. In the same period, it generated a net income of €5.87 billion, up 9%.
Copyright © 2025 FashionNetwork.com All rights reserved. Tags : Fashion Ready-to-wear Fashion Retail
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Fashion Network
5 minutes ago
- Fashion Network
Zara founder Ortega buys Barcelona office building for $283 million, sources say
Zara founder Amancio Ortega has bought an office building in Barcelona from Blackstone for €250 million ($283 million), two sources familiar with the transaction said on Friday. The sources said Blackstone sold the 28,000-square-meter building on Avenida Diagonal—currently rented by the Spanish editorial business Planeta—to Ortega's investment vehicle Pontegadea. Pontegadea and Blackstone did not comment on the agreement. Pontegadea, which owns more than $20 billion in real estate assets, has invested in several office towers and luxury buildings across Europe and North America. It has also diversified its portfolio by buying energy and logistics assets. Ortega controls 59.29% of Zara-owner Inditex through Pontegadea Inversiones and Partler Participaciones. ($1 = €0.8826)
Euronews
16 minutes ago
- Euronews
Working week: Where in Europe people clock the most and least hours?
The EU motto "United in Diversity" couldn't be truer for the average working hours across the bloc. The latest Eurostat dataset illustrates a very large spectrum of how much time employees spend grinding through a full-time working week. On paper, the Greeks slog the most. Workers there put in an average of nearly 40 hours (39.8), the highest in the EU. Bulgaria, Poland and Romania follow next with around 39 hours a week. But beyond the EU, the workweek stretches even further, 43 hours in Turkey and 41 in Serbia. The report also shows EU citizens work slightly less compared to ten years ago. The average across the bloc is now 36 hours, down from 37 in 2014. Data also shows which sectors work the most and the least. Agriculture workers tend to have the longest weeks: 41 hours, followed by mining and construction workers at nearly 39. At the other end of the spectrum, education workers have the shortest week with almost 32 hours, followed by arts employees at 32.9 and social workers at 33.4. Four-day working weeks have been trialled across Europe with mixed results and feedback. Companies took part in pilots and tests in countries like the UK, Germany, Portugal, Iceland, France and Spain. In any case, no European country has officially mandated a four-day work week with reduced hours across all working sectors. Belgium was the first European country to enshrine the shorter week into law, in 2022. However, although employees can choose to work four days instead of five, they still need to work the same number of hours.
Euronews
26 minutes ago
- Euronews
Russia accuses Serbia of ‘stabbing Moscow in the back' by arming Kyiv
Russia accused Serbia of exporting arms to Ukraine, calling it a "stab in the back" from one of Moscow's longest-standing European allies. The Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) issued a statement on Thursday claiming that "Serbian defence enterprises, contrary to the 'neutrality' declared by official Belgrade, continue to supply ammunition to Kyiv.' The statement alleged that the export of the Serbian arms to Ukraine was going through NATO intermediaries, "primarily the Czech Republic, Poland and Bulgaria." "Recently, exotic options involving African states have also been used for this purpose," SVR said. Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić denied the accusations on Friday, saying that although the contract with the Czech Republic does exist, it does not allow exporting the materiel to another country. "For example, they correctly say that there is a contract with the Czech Republic. But no permission was given, and none of the (ammunition) was delivered" to Ukraine, Vučić told Serbian state broadcaster RTS. He added that he had already discussed the issue of arms exports to Ukraine with Russian President Vladimir Putin recently and that it was agreed that Moscow and Belgrade would create a "working group" to establish how Serbian-made weapons reached Ukraine. This is not the first time Vučić has had to respond to similar claims. The Financial Times reported in June 2024 that Serbian ammunition worth €750 million has made its way indirectly to Ukraine. In March, Belgrade denied it exported arms to Kyiv after Moscow demanded to know if it had delivered thousands of rockets for Ukraine's defence against Russia's all-out invasion. Serbian arms' presence in Ukraine, mostly Soviet-era calibre ammunition adopted as standard and manufactured in the former Yugoslavia, has been publicly discussed since 2023, but it is unclear why the Russian foreign security service decided to react now. The SVR has claimed that the arms sales are being carried out through a "simple scheme using fake end-user certificates and intermediary countries" serving as "a cover for anti-Russian actions". The accusations out of Moscow went even further to say that "the contribution of Serbian defence industry workers to the war unleashed by the West, the outcome of which Europe would like to see as a 'strategic defeat' of Russia, amounts to hundreds of thousands of shells ... as well as a million rounds of ammunition for small arms". 'It seems that the desire of Serbian defence industry workers and their patrons to profit from the blood of fraternal Slavic peoples has made them completely forget who their real friends are and who their enemies are," the statement said. Vučić stated that the attacks on Serbia from the East and the West are "frequent" because Belgrade "leads autonomous and independent policies". Serbia is one of the countries in the Western Balkans that is considered a major candidate for EU membership. At the same time, Vučić has maintained close ties with Russia, including after Moscow's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. He was among a handful of European leaders to attend Putin's Victory Day parade in Moscow on 9 May, a decision Vučić defended by saying he was there to celebrate Serbia's participation in liberating the continent from fascism in World War II. Serbia also refused to join Western sanctions on Russia and hasn't supported most EU statements condemning Moscow's full-scale invasion, although it voted in favour of its condemnation at the UN.
