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☆ Zara shopworkers call off strikes in company's hometown after pay rise deal - union
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-23 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

MADRID, Dec 23 (Reuters) - A union representing shop assistants at fashion retailer Zara has called off planned strikes in the company's hometown in northern Spain following an agreement on a pay rise, a union leader said on Friday. Around 1,000 workers at Zara shops and other Inditex (ITX.MC) fashion brands had announced they would strike on Dec. 23 and Jan. 7 to demand higher wage increases after rejecting the company's previous offer. CIG had pushed for a bigger pay rise after rejecting a hike of 200 euros in monthly salaries by 2024. The company will start to pay the newly agreed wages in January, Naveiro said. ($1 = 0.9432 euros)Reporting by Corina Pons; Editing by David Latona and Kenneth MaxwellOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

[1/2] People visit a retail store during the holiday season in New York City, U.S., December 15, 2022. So far, shopper visits to many retail segments, including apparel and electronics, are down year-over-year, according to foot-traffic data from Placer.AI. Zara, the fast-fashion chain, aggressively raised prices this year without turning off shoppers, while dollar stores including Dollar General (DG.N) expanded their array of merchandise. Dollar stores have also shown momentum as more consumers traded down. Discount and dollar stores saw visits up 1.1% year-over-year, and up 7.8% compared to Super Saturday 2019, according to Placer.AI foot-traffic data.

☆ H&M agrees to pay a 500 euro bonus to 4,000 workers in January
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-21 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

MADRID, Dec 21 (Reuters) - Swedish fashion retailer H&M (HMb.ST) agreed to pay a 500 euro ($530) bonus to some 4,000 shop workers in Spain in January, two unions said on Wednesday, after its arch-rival Inditex (ITX.MC) offered 1,000 euros to its home country shop assistants. The world's biggest fashion retailers are responding to demands from their workers for higher pay to offset soaring consumer prices. The Sweden-based fashion retailer will pay 500 euros to all its shop workers who have been employed in Spain at least since January 2022. The company will pay 250 euros to those who have worked at least six months. Soaring consumer prices have pushed unions in Spain to press sometimes reluctant employers for pay raises.

☆ Zara founder buys Seattle skyscraper for $323 million
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-15 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

MADRID, Dec 15 (Reuters) - Spanish billionaire and Zara founder Amancio Ortega has bought a residential skyscraper in Seattle for $323 million, his private firm Pontegadea said on Thursday. Ortega, the main shareholder of fashion giant Inditex (ITX.MC) and one of the world's 30 wealthiest entrepreneurs, signed the deal yesterday through his family office, Pontegadea added. Kiara tower, located in Seattle's South Lake Union neighbourhood in the United States, has 461 luxury apartments and is 133 metres tall. The purchase follows a $500-million investment in a 64-floor skyscraper of luxury apartments in New York's Financial District. Just this year, Ortega's investment vehicle also bought Royal Bank Plaza, a landmark skyscraper in Toronto, and one of the largest single-office buildings in Scotland.

'REFUGE FOR WINTER' AND BEYONDVisitors and more permanent residents are also arriving from Germany, which was highly dependent on Russian gas before the Ukraine war and is anxious about possible winter energy shortages. Airlines will increase by 31% the number of seats available to the Canary Islands, the regional tourism office said. Airbnb, the short-term rentals firm, said searches for winter stays in southern Europe tripled between April and June. "Even before the energy crisis, we would have liked to be in Portugal because of the weather," the 28-year-old said. "But with the energy crisis, (being in Portugal) gives us more security because of the climate."

☆ Zara workers in Spain start protests to demand higher pay
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-24 | by ( Corina Pons | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

MADRID, Nov 24 (Reuters) - Dozens of Zara shop assistants protested in Madrid on Thursday outside the global fashion giant's largest store to demand higher pay, and some workers in its home town in northwest Spain went on strike on the eve of its Black Friday sales campaign. In the town of A Coruna, where the first Zara store opened in 1975, Inditex now has 44 stores. Two of those, a Zara store and a Massimo Dutti shop were closed on Thursday, and some 1,000 shopworkers were preparing to go on a one-day strike the following day on Black Friday. Shop assistants' monthly wages at Inditex stores in Madrid and A Coruna are below 1,400 euros, according to the unions. "If we don't get better wages we will call for more protests in December and January," she said.

☆ Spanish short-term rentals boom has tourist sector clamouring for rules
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-22 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

Spanish travel industry association Exceltur said that about 300,000 homes are offered for short-term rental in the country's 20 largest cities, with some 389,779 rooms managed by hotels. Exceltur, which groups together major Spanish hotel chains, travel agents, tour operators and airlines, is lobbying for a new law to regulate short-term rental platforms such as such as Airbnb, describing the situation as "out of control". Renting to tourists is twice as profitable as offering long-term rentals to residents, the Exceltur study showed. In Spain, short-term rentals are also cheaper, on average, than hotels. These include forcing platforms to verify that individual hosts are properly registered as tourist accommodation providers, with official permission to operate.

☆ Spanish shopworkers' unions to discuss wages with Zara bosses
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-16 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

MADRID, Nov 16 (Reuters) - Trade unions representing about 1,000 Zara shop assistants in the Spanish apparel maker's hometown of A Coruña will meet with the company on Thursday to negotiate a pay rise, a union leader said. Zara owner Inditex (ITX.MC) has so far offered a rise of 183 euros per month, staggered over three years, on salaries that range between 1,058 euros and 1,400 euros a month, Naveiro said. Representatives of the company's two largest unions, UGT and CCOO, confirmed they will also attend the meeting. "We're placing our bets on negotiations because Inditex is sitting at the table," Lucia Trenor, a union leader at CCOO said. The shop assistants want to be paid the same as workers at the company's logistics centres, who earn about 2,000 euros a month.

In Germany, the HDE retail association is forecasting the strongest slump in Christmas sales since 2007, with retail sales in the crucial November-December period seen dropping by 4% year on year on a price-adjusted basis. In the United Kingdom, a raft of surveys indicate half or more Britons plan to spend less this Christmas. Should September's sharp drop in retail sales be repeated in December, it would be the worst outcome since comparable annual records began in 1989. Official data showed UK retail sales volumes, excluding fuel, dropped 6.2% year on year in September. Another association Acotex expects retailers to offer slight discounts during the holiday season as consumer demand slows.

☆ Spain's Sacyr sees motorways fuelling double-digit core profit growth
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-11 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

Motorways recently completed in several Latin American countries and in Italy, along with three more transport projects that will be ready by 2023, should provide the world's fourth-largest transport concession group with steady cash flow for the next 25 years. Most of Sacyr's concession contracts are tied to inflation and have a mechanism making them less dependent on traffic volumes. The divestment plan would bring additional funds to speed up growth in its concession infrastructure businesses mainly in continental Europe, Britain, Australia and Canada. The CFO ruled out a total exit from the water business as it looks to take advantage of opportunities for new water supply units in Central Europe, the United States and Australia amid widening droughts. ($1 = 0.9707 euros)Reporting by Corina Pons, editing by Andrei Khalip, Kirsten DonovanOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ Spain briefly closes part of airspace as Chinese rocket debris flies over
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-04 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

MADRID, Nov 4 (Reuters) - Spain briefly closed the airspace over the northeastern region of Catalonia and three other regions on Friday as remnants of a Chinese rocket were expected to pass by, emergency authorities in Catalonia said on Friday. The Long March 5B (CZ-5B), China's most powerful rocket, blasted off on Oct. 31 from southern China to deliver the last module of the Chinese space station currently under construction. As gravity pulls the rocket back to Earth, most of it is expected to burn up on re-entry, though there are concerns sizable chunks might survive. "These predictions however come with uncertainties, and a better estimation will only be possible close to the re-entry." Debris from the second flight landed harmlessly in the Indian Ocean, while remnants from the third fell into the Sulu Sea in the Philippines.

☆ VW's SEAT says Spain's subsidy for battery plant, EV production 'not sufficient'
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-03 | by ( Corina Pons | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

MADRID, Nov 3 (Reuters) - The chief of Volkswagen's (VOWG_p.DE) Spanish unit SEAT said on Thursday the subsidies offered by Spanish authorities for a battery factory construction and electric vehicle production "is not sufficient", but voiced optimism about finding a solution. Speaking at a panel in Madrid, SEAT Chairman Wayne Griffiths said the solution, which he did not specify, has to be found within 10 days. "Spain is capable of making one of the best cars in the world," Griffiths said, highlighting the country's renewable energy capacity. However, he lamented the fact that the country had also one of the lowest shares of electric vehicles in Europe. Reporting by Corina Pons, writing by Joan Faus, editing by David Latona and Tomasz JanowskiOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ Inditex sells Russian business to Middle Eastern Daher Group
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-25 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

MADRID, Oct 25 (Reuters) - Zara owner Inditex (ITX.MC) has agreed to sell its stores in Russia to UAE-based Daher Group, though it did not rule out returning to the country if circumstances change, the Spanish clothing company said on Tuesday. Inditex closed its over 500 stores in Russia in March following Moscow's invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24 and subsequent Western sanctions. Provided landlords approve the change in ownership, the Spanish firm said its premises could be adapted to accommodate Daher's operations. A company source told Reuters that Daher Group is Emirati. Reporting by David Latona and Corina Pons; Editing by Andrei Khalip and Josie KaoOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ Analysis: Price hikes test Inditex's ability to stay in fashion
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-15 | by ( Corina Pons | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

Instead, it should consider incremental, targeted increases to test customers' willingness to pay more, rather than automatic and across-the-board price rises, they said. The world's biggest fashion retailer said on Wednesday it would raise prices again in the second half of the year after spring and summer increases. Fashion manufacturers in Europe and North America continue to feel pressure from rising energy, labour, transport and raw material costs and so are likely to have to raise prices more. "While first price increases were accepted in the first half of the year ... we expect Inditex and most peers to post double-digit price increases in Europe in the second semester. The cumulative price increases of 15-20% in Europe are likely to lead to consumers trading down," Credit Suisse said in a research note.

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