German appliance manufacturer Miele has revealed that its sales revenue increased 2.2 per cent during the 2014 financial year, totaling 3.22 billion euro, or AU $4.57 billion. Miele is a family-owned company that does not reveal the full spectrum of its financial results, such as profitability.
Locally, Miele’s wholly owned Australian subsidiary, its fourth largest sales market after Germany, the United States and Switzerland, experienced “above-average growth”, though no precise details were provided. The company did report that despite this prima facie strong performance, the growth “was transformed into a double-digit drop after conversion into euros”. The Australian dollar is currently trading at 70.4 euro cents; its nadir over the past 12 months was 63.5 euro cents in January 2014 while its zenith was 70.7 euro cents.
The company praised itself for achieving its sustainable growth targets despite adverse global economic conditions. Much of this was due to the new rollout of Miele’s Generation 6000 range of premium cooking appliances, which has been widely accalimed by Miele’s dealers and consumers, as well as in the media.
“In a year marked by the largest product and innovation offensive in its history — Miele renewed virtually its entire range of domestic appliances — and was able to more than compensate for the inclement economic conditions which prevailed in key sales markets,” Miele said in a statement.
Dr Markus Miele, executive director and co-proprietor of the company his great-grandfather started in 1899, said Miele should be able to continue growing its turnover, units sales and market share through the next 12 months, even if conditions remain unfavourable. His fellow executive director and co-proprietor Dr Reinhard Zinkann concurred:
“Being independent of the vested interests of third-party money lenders strengthens Miele’s position as an independent and unaffiliated German family-owned company,” he said.
In addition to the recently released Generation 6000 , W1/T1 laundry appliances and Scout robot vacuum, Miele will unveiling new products at IFA in Berlin in early September 2014.
“IFA 2014 will see the launch of new flagship washing machines and tumble dryers offering further unique selling propositions and superb consumer benefits. At the same time, the company is to present a completely restructured vacuum cleaner range, which…caters for real consumer needs.”