Beaumanoir, the ‘Breton Inditex’ Achieves €2.1 Billion in Sales Amidst Acquisition Spree

While Ikks dodges bankruptcy in extremis with a plan led by its president Santiago Cucci and Michaël Benabou, co-founder of Veepee, the other great silent protagonist of French ready-to-wear (who was also in the bidding to take over the iconic Parisian style brand) continues to fatten its empire. Beaumanoir, the Breton polder that owns chains such as Cache-Cache, Morgan, Bréal and Vib’s, increased its turnover to €2.1 billion in fiscal year 2024, closed on February 28th, and nearly doubled its operating profit in the midst of a cycle of opportunistic acquisitions.

The Saint-Malo-based group has, for years, been involved in a succession of transactions that have made it the buyer of last resort in mid-range fashion. After taking over part of La Halle, incorporating Caroll, acquiring the Sarenza footwear platform and taking over Boardriders’ European business, the holding company has continued to add assets with Jennyfer and, last August, with part of Naf Naf, as well as taking an interest in some Ikks stores as part of its insolvency proceedings.

Far from the Parisian boulevards, Beaumanoir has built an empire from stores in medium-sized cities, hybrid formats such as Vib’s and its own logistics, C-Log, which has become its silent weapon. The strategy is to buy cheap, integrate quickly and squeeze without fanfare a map of stores that other groups have dropped, in an increasingly narrow national chessboard.

Beaumanoir raised its 2024 sales to €2.1 billion

The figures for the 2024 financial year confirm the group’s financial muscle. According to the documentation filed by the company in the bankruptcy proceedings, Beaumanoir raised its turnover from €1.76 billion in the previous fiscal year to €2.1 billion, while its operating income rose from €78.8 million to €136.5 million. The dossier itself warns that the figures may not reflect all the activities of the holding company, but the trend points to a clear improvement in its margins.

The contrast comes when we look at the situation of the subsidiaries that support this growth. Cafan, which operates the Morgan brand, increased its turnover from €158.9 million in 2023 to €165.3 million in 2024, but with declining profitability. Operating profit has fallen three years in a row, from 9.6 million in 2022 to 5.3 million in 2023 and 2.9 million last year.

In the case of Cariboo, the small retail company linked to Boardriders, the figures are different. Over a shortened fiscal year of just four months, the company posted revenue of €8.7 million in 2024, compared to €27.6 million a year earlier over twelve months. The volume fell due to the tight schedule, but the operating result improved from €131,000 to €194,000, in full integration of the surf and street brands into the group’s logistics machinery.

For its part, the high-end brand Caroll, another of Beaumanoir’s strategic assets, also illustrates the dual face of the model. The chain, with a more urban profile and a presence in central hubs, raised its net sales from €166 million in 2023 to 173 million in 2024, with 20.5 million coming from exports. The commercial progress did not, however, prevent the company from going into the red. Operating profit came in at €967,000, compared with a slight profit of just over €930,000 a year earlier.

The group relies on a solid parent company, financial prudence and fine-tuned logistics, but operates brands that are suffering from the same storm as the rest of French ready-to-wear, with less store traffic, price pressure and competition from ultra-fast fashion platforms. The challenge is to stabilize these brands within the perimeter of a holding company that thinks in the long term.

The group has already exceeded €2 billion in sales in 2022 and has almost doubled in size since the pandemic. The La Halle operation strengthened its muscle in secondary cities; the purchase of Caroll and Sarenza added a more urban and digital leg; while Boardriders brought volume and exposure to surf and sport and Jennyfer gave it a direct entry into the teen segment, almost empty after the decline of Pimkie.

This expansion has also fueled debate about Beaumanoir’s role in the French ecosystem. One part of the unions speaks of the crow effect, which flies over the contests to rescue what is profitable and leave the rest in the hands of the courts. Another part of the sector sees in the group a lifeline that avoids cascading closures and maintains employment in provinces where mid-range fashion was one of the few commercial engines.

Beaumanoir’s rise cannot be understood without the progressive collapse of other national players. The implosion of Vivarte, the sale of Pimkie, the liquidation of Camaïeu or the recurring difficulties of Naf Naf have left the French map without any major mid-range groups with a vocation for consolidation. In this vacuum, the Breton polder has become the only hand raised when a commercial judge puts a chain on the market.

With more than 15,000 employees and hundreds of points of sale spread among Cache-Cache, Bonobo, Bréal, Morgan, Vib’s, La Halle, Jennyfer, Boardriders and now part of Naf Naf, Beaumanoir has reached a size comparable to that of the former Vivarte without the need for capital rounds or major marketing campaigns.