NORTH American retailers have increased their use of air freight to meet rising demand and to help mitigate delays, reports London's Air Cargo News.
'On the supply side, we are seeing uncertainty. There are delays, but there is just some uncertainty surrounding the supply as well,' said PVH Corp chief financial officer Mike Shaffer.
'So as we look at some of the countries where we do significant amounts of business, India for knits and Sri Lanka for underwear, those countries are under lockdowns,' said Mr Shaffer.
'We have many different modes of expedited freight. So, we can use faster ships, believe it or not, our air freight. We have found air freight constrained. There were not a lot of flights,' said Mr Shaffer.
Said Levi Strauss & Co vice president Harmit Singh: 'We've been able to offset the impact of the delay in quarter one and we think we can offset that in quarter two,'
'In terms of cost, as I mentioned, in the last quarter we negotiated capacity and that allowed us - is allowing us to offset some of the increases that we can see,' said Mr Singh.
'We have had to increase our air freight but given the strong gross margin we had overall I think that's again being offset ?? at least in the short term,' said Mr Singh.
Athletic apparel retailer Lululemon declared they've been strategically using air freight to offset supply chain issues.
Chief financial officer Meghan Frank said: 'While we continue to see some delayed inventory receipts due to issues at the ports, our team is strategically using air freight, and we are comfortable with the level and composition of our inventory as we move into second quarter,'
'Inventory was certainly one area where we postured to drive for growth, both throughout 2020 as we navigated the pandemic and then into 2021,' said Ms Frank.
'The team has been really proactive in strategically leveraging air freight to meet demand and we do have the ability to chase categories and keeping a close eye on what's going on with the supply chain, but we feel really well positioned to navigate through this year,' said Ms Frank.
SeaNews Turkey
'On the supply side, we are seeing uncertainty. There are delays, but there is just some uncertainty surrounding the supply as well,' said PVH Corp chief financial officer Mike Shaffer.
'So as we look at some of the countries where we do significant amounts of business, India for knits and Sri Lanka for underwear, those countries are under lockdowns,' said Mr Shaffer.
'We have many different modes of expedited freight. So, we can use faster ships, believe it or not, our air freight. We have found air freight constrained. There were not a lot of flights,' said Mr Shaffer.
Said Levi Strauss & Co vice president Harmit Singh: 'We've been able to offset the impact of the delay in quarter one and we think we can offset that in quarter two,'
'In terms of cost, as I mentioned, in the last quarter we negotiated capacity and that allowed us - is allowing us to offset some of the increases that we can see,' said Mr Singh.
'We have had to increase our air freight but given the strong gross margin we had overall I think that's again being offset ?? at least in the short term,' said Mr Singh.
Athletic apparel retailer Lululemon declared they've been strategically using air freight to offset supply chain issues.
Chief financial officer Meghan Frank said: 'While we continue to see some delayed inventory receipts due to issues at the ports, our team is strategically using air freight, and we are comfortable with the level and composition of our inventory as we move into second quarter,'
'Inventory was certainly one area where we postured to drive for growth, both throughout 2020 as we navigated the pandemic and then into 2021,' said Ms Frank.
'The team has been really proactive in strategically leveraging air freight to meet demand and we do have the ability to chase categories and keeping a close eye on what's going on with the supply chain, but we feel really well positioned to navigate through this year,' said Ms Frank.
SeaNews Turkey