H&M Has Lagged Behind Zara Owner Inditex In Online Shopping. Both Stocks Fell.

The Covid-19 pandemic caused sales to slump at retail giants Inditex and Hennes & Mauritz (H&M) in November, reversing glimmers of a recovery and shining a light on the very different online sales performance between the two companies.

Shares in both companies fell in European trading, with Inditex, which owns Zara, trading near 2% lower and H&M dropping more than 2% on Tuesday.

The back story. As global coronavirus infection rates slowed through the summer and government restrictions were loosened, shoppers flocked back to stores after months of retail closures. Both Spanish Inditex and Swedish H&M—the largest and second-largest fashion chains in the world, respectively—returned to profitability in the autumn after large losses.

With the Covid-19 pandemic keeping millions of shoppers housebound, Inditex has made a key investment in expanding online shopping. In June, the company announced a €2.7 billion ($4.34 billion) investment plan to improve online operations and increase store footprint, of which €1 billion was earmarked for digital investments.

H&M, still controlled by its founding Persson family, was already struggling before the pandemic hit. The company has been slower to shift to online shopping in favour of its more than 5,000 stores and the low-cost fashion strategy it helped pioneer.

What’s new. Both companies reported results on Tuesday—Inditex for the three months to the end of October, and H&M for the quarter ending Nov. 30 as well as the full year.

Store and online sales grew slowly from August to October at Inditex, with October sales at 94% of 2019 levels at constant currencies. In total, net sales of €6.1 billion in the third quarter were 14% lower than the same period in 2019. However, as coronavirus cases surged in November, 21% of stores remained closed and sales fell to 81% of 2019 levels.

At H&M, net sales for the fourth quarter were 10% lower in local currencies from the same period last year. Much of that came in the final month: sales were down by just 3% year-over-year from Sept. 1 to Oct. 21, but were 22% lower than 2019 in the period from Oct. 22 to Nov. 30.

Looking ahead. The results from the retail giants show the impact the second wave of Covid-19 has brought on sales. Fears over how much this hurts the bottom line for the full year is what may have caused both stocks to fall.

But the results also shine a light on the companies’ different online strategies—a crucial sales platform beyond the pandemic. Inditex reported that online sales grew 76% in the nine months to the end of October, while analysts expect H&M to lag far behind. The Swedish retailer didn’t post any fresh online figures on Tuesday. It had posted online sales growth of 40% in the second quarter and just 27% in the third.

An original watercolour illustration for the cover of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, 1997 — the first book in J.K. Rowling’s hit series—could sell for US$600,000 at a Sotheby’s auction this summer.

The illustration is headlining a June 26 sale in New York that will also feature big-ticket items from the collection of the late Dr. Rodney P. Swantko, a surgeon and collector from Indiana, including manuscripts by poet Edgar Allan Poe and Arthur Conan Doyle, author of the Sherlock Holmes books

The Harry Potter illustration, which introduced the young wizard character to the world, is expected to sell for between US$400,000 to US$600,000, which would make it the highest-priced item ever sold related to the Harry Potter world. This is the second time the illustration has been sold, however—it was on the auction block at Sotheby’s in London in 2001, where it achieved £85,750 (US$107,316).

The artist of the illustration, Thomas Taylor, was 23 years old at the time and a graduate student working at a children’s bookshop. According to Sotheby’s, Taylor took a “professional commission from an unknown author to visualise a unique wizarding world,” Sotheby’s said in a news release. He depicted Harry Potter boarding the train to Hogwarts on platform9 ¾ platform, and the illustration became the “universal image” of the Harry Potter series, Sotheby’s said.

“It is exciting to see the painting that marks the very start of my career, decades later and as bright as ever! It takes me back to the experience of reading Harry Potter for the first time—one of the first people in the world to do so—and the process of creating what is now an iconic image,” Taylor said in the release.

Meanwhile, to commemorate the 175th anniversary of Edgar Allan Poe’s For Annie , 1849, Sotheby’s recently reunited the autographed manuscript of the poem with the author’s home, Poe Cottage, in the Bronx.

The cottage is where the author lived with his wife, Virginia, and mother-in-law, Maria Clemm, from 1846 until he died in 1849. The manuscript, also from the Swantko collection, will remain at the home until it is offered at auction at Sotheby’s on June 26 with an estimate between US$400,000 and US$600,000.

The autographed manuscript will remain at Poe Cottage until it is offered at auction at Sotheby’s on June 26.
Matthew Borowick for Sotheby’s

Poe Cottage, preserved and overseen by the Bronx County Historical Society, is home to many of the author’s famous works, including Eureka , 1948, and Annabel Lee , 1927.

“To reunite the For Annie manuscript with the Poe Cottage nearly two centuries after it was first composed brought to life literary history for a truly special and unique occasion,” Richard Austin , Sotheby’s Global Head of Books & Manuscripts, said in a news release.

For Annie was one of Poe’s most important compositions, and was addressed to Nancy “Annie” L. Richmond, one of the several women Poe pursued after his wife Viriginia’s death from tuberculosis in 1847.

In a letter to Richmond herself, Poe proclaimed For Annie was his best work: “I think the lines For Annie much the best I have ever written.”

The poem was composed in 1849, only months before Poe’s death, Sotheby’s said in the piece, Poe highlights the romantic comfort he feels from a woman named Annie while simultaneously grappling with the darkness of death, with lines like “And the fever called ‘living’ is conquered at last.”

Poe Cottage, preserved and overseen by the Bronx County Historical Society, is home to many of the author’s famous works, including Eureka, 1948, and Annabel Lee,, 1927.
Matthew Borowick for Sotheby’s

In the margins of the manuscript are the original handwritten instructions by Nathaniel P. Willis, co-editor of the New York Home Journal, where Poe published other poems such as The Raven and submitted For Annie on April 20, 1849.

Willis added Poe’s name in the top right and instructions about printing and presenting the poem on the side. The poem was also published in the Boston Weekly that same month.

Another piece of literary history included in the Swantko sale could surpass US$1 million. Conan Doyle’s autographed manuscript of the Sherlock Holmes tale The Sign of Four , 1889, is estimated to achieve between US$800,000 and US$1.2 million.