H&M launches online stores in 8 new European countries

H&M will launch online stores in eight different countries in Europe during 2015. The new online markets will be Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Portugal, Romania, and Slovakia. H&M’s online stores are already available in eleven European countries.

The press release H&M sent out is short, very short, but we bet that next year you will hear a lot more about H&M and its urge to expand. In fact, the Swedish company has even dedicated a webpage on its expansion strategy on hm.com. There it says: “We are growing with quality, sustainability and high profitability. H&M is growing with new stores the world over and online. There is room for further expansion for the Group in existing markets as well as in new countries.”

Online stores in Europe
In 2015, these new countries will be Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Portugal, Romania, and Slovakia. When H&M has launched its online stores there, it then has an online presence in 19 European countries, as it already has online stores up and running in Austria, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom. Outside of Europe it also has online stores in the United States and China.

Back in August of this year, H&M opened an online store in Spain and in March it launched its ecommerce site in France. On the aforementioned webpage about its expansion strategy H&M states that its growth target is to increase the number of stores by 10-15% per year, and at the same time increase sales in comparable units. H&M’s strong pace of expansion continued this year with a planned 375 new stores set. Maybe all these offline and online store launches helped the Swedish fashion retailer to become the most valuable retail brand in Europe.