Koovs moves into Middle East with Souq.com deal

By

Sandra Halliday

Published
Mar 31, 2017

London-listed fashion e-tailer Koovs has announced a deal to expand into “additional high potential markets” in the Middle East.

The company signed its first international distribution agreement Friday to launch the Koovs Private Label Collection on Souq.com, the leading e-commerce portal in the Middle East, this summer. The Souq deal will see it marketing its bestselling Private Label Collection that is currently Koovs.com's leading single brand, accounting for 40% of sales.

Souq.com claims over 24 million unique visits per month and is growing fast as more Middle eastern consumers shop online. Often referred to as the Amazon of the region, only this week it was acquired by Amazon for a price estimated to be around $650 million. That deal is likely to reinforce its position as the key shopping site for Arab world consumers.

While Koovs also said Friday that it plans to expand in Asia-Pacific too, its core market remains India, which is the fastest growing e-commerce market globally. The company said that working with international distribution and fulfilment partners will enable it to leverage in-country expertise in logistics and marketing without distracting it from its India focus.

The company has been expanding fast in its domestic market and in January announced that nine-month sales had risen 101% year-on-year to £13.45 million.

As Koovs has grown it has announced more ‘special’ collections with this month seeing it announcing a link-up with Brazilian-born designer Daniella Helayel for The Princess Collection. Helayel is an A-list favourite and is also worn by the Duchess of Cambridge. With the duchess’s sister, Pippa Middleton getting married this year, Koovs is making the most of the royal connection and will launch the new line in May, in time for the summer party season.

In February the e-tailer also partnered with with Masaba Gupta to launch an athleisure collection, Masaba X Koovs.