Now Stella's on the up

Stella McCartney: sales up by 65%

Italian fashion house Gucci today signalled its confidence in star designer Stella McCartney amid increasing evidence of an accelerating recovery in the luxury goods sector.

Gucci's third-quarter numbers pointed to a soaring recovery in the bombed-out luxury sector and showed the first-ever operating profit for its Yves Saint Laurent brand. Group revenues surged 12.8% to e695 million (£487 million) in what executive chairman Domenico de Sole called "a great quarter for the group". Operating profit before goodwill amortisation was up 11.2% to e101 million.

Gucci-brand sales rose 21.6% in the first 14 days of December while YSL ready-towear and Bottega Veneta shoes and handbags jumped 39%. De Sole said there was spectacular sales growth from young British designers Stella McCartney and Alexander McQueen in the quarter to end-October. "Stella McCartney had an outstanding quarter," he said. "Overall sales of McCartney and McQueen were up 65.5% and 20.8% respectively."

McCartney said this month that her business, which had sales of £434,600 in the year to 31 January, lost more than £7 million in its first two years and was being bailed out with £4.5 million a year by Gucci. But de Sole insisted that Gucci retained every confidence in its 31-year-old protègè.

De Sole said nothing about future plans when and chief designer Tom Ford leave the group in April.

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