Puma to keep spending on marketing to revive brand: CEO

[FRANKFURT] German sportswear firm Puma plans to keep spending on marketing and on winning endorsements from star athletes, its chief executive said, seeking to revive a brand that still lags market leaders Nike and Adidas.

"We see that we are not going to decrease marketing. It will always stay between 10 per cent and 12 per cent of sales," Bjorn Gulden told journalists after the company published full second-quarter results.

Puma's operating expenses rose 11 per cent in the second quarter as it spent on marketing and retail, but demand for new high-margin shoe models still helped more than triple its operating profit (EBIT) to 43.4 million euros (S$69.053 million).

Earlier this month, the group hiked its guidance for 2017 sales and operating profit as it announced a 16 per cent jump in currency-adjusted second-quarter sales.

REUTERS