‘H&M will launch online discount store’

Swedish fashion retailer H&M is secretly working on a new project, which aims to sell branded clothes online at discount prices. For now, the project has been dubbed P12 and it’s expected to launch somewhere in April.

Swedish business website Breakit broke the news, adding there are already agreements in place with about sixty fashion brands to have their items sold on the new online discount store. H&M is said to internally describe the new platform as a style and dealhunting paradise.

‘100 employees are working on online discount store’

H&M hasn’t confirmed or denied anything about ‘P12’, but according to Breakit the team behind the project is located in an anonymous office building north of Stockholm and consists of around 100 employees.

According to Breakit-founder Stefan Lundell, the news of H&M launching an online discount store comes at a perfect time. The Swedish fashion giant has been criticized, after the company released a “disappointing” fourth quarter report, in which it became known that H&M’s sales decreased by 2 percent during that period.

Launch of Arket

As said, H&M doesn’t want to confirm the news (yet). Nils Vinge, the company’s head of investor relations, said they never talk about these kind of projects before they are launched. ““We always have several new projects in progress and recently launched Arket.” Arket is H&M’s latest retail brand, which it launched in 18 countries across Europe in March last year. The brand features both Arket’s own products and non-H&M brands and is priced a little higher than products of the core H&M brand.