By Equipe de Redação
Posted in June 27, 2022
Pedro Zemel, CEO of Grupo SBF, during the recording of the talk show at EXAME studio (Exame/Reproduction).
The group doubled in size after acquiring Nike Brazil, with an annual revenue of approximately R$ 7 billion.
“Until Jeff Bezos, with Amazon, bought Whole Foods, I had to explain what a store was for,” recalls Pedro Zemel, CEO of Grupo SBF, the owner of Centauro and Nike Brazil, regarding the initial concept of the marketplace when many believed that physical stores would disappear, leaving only digital commerce. The company, which went public about three years ago, has doubled in size and currently generates an annual revenue of around R$ 7 billion. “The channel is a tactical choice, not a strategic one. We have always believed in that. One channel does not prevail over the other,” he comments during the EXAME IN talk show.
Now, the group is preparing for a significant expansion of Nike stores, which may have as many units as Centauro, present in 26 states across Brazil. “China has thousands of stores, and Brazil has 23. China has seven times more feet than Brazil, not hundreds,” he emphasizes. The first Nike Store, aiming to provide a different, more comprehensive experience and offer products for casual use, including women’s audience, will be inaugurated this month. The group’s plan includes two types of stores: complete units with collections, and units for older products.
During the chat, Zemel explains how the group works on the concept of a horizontal platform, an ecosystem, to take advantage of the genuine connection that sports allow with customers, even though sports fashion purchases are not recurring. The company currently has 31 million registered CPFs (taxpayer identification numbers) and in the last 12 months, 8 million customers made purchases within the group. Digital sales have increased from 5% to 10% of the total, according to pre-pandemic data, to 30% post-pandemic.
In the conversation, the executive presented data on how omnichannel is working within the business, for example, currently, 7.5% of a store’s sales come from products that are not physically present there. The customer tries and selects the product, but if it’s not available in the desired color and size, it is sent to the buyer’s home later. Also, 50% of digital sales go through the physical stores, either because the delivery originates from there or because the customer chooses to pick up the purchase from a nearby unit.
As part of the ecosystem journey, Grupo SBF established SBF Ventures, which invests in startups to strengthen customer relations and consumer knowledge, along with other sports-related experiences beyond just the purchase. The portfolio currently includes four businesses: NWB, a sports broadcasting company with 1.8 billion views in 2021, FitDance with 2 billion views, Onefan, an app for football fans, and X3M, a producer of live events for sports marketing.
Together, these businesses will generate revenue of R$ 100 million this year. This amount may seem modest within the group, but the main objective, beyond revenue diversification, is the network effect. In Zemel’s vision, one day, sports enthusiasts will be connected to Grupo SBF every day. In the last three quarters, the digital business’s profit margin has actually surpassed that of physical stores.
Besides Zemel, the program has already hosted other corporate and financial world personalities such as Roberto Fulcherberguer, President of Via, the owner of Casas Bahia, Cesario Nakamura (Alelo), Cristina Andriotti (Ambipar Environment), Roberto Funari (Alpargatas), Abilio Diniz (GPA), Felipe Miranda (Empiricus), Eduardo Mufarej (GK Ventures), Augusto Lins (Stone), Rodrigo Abreu (Oi), Cláudia Woods (WeWork), Dennis Herszkowicz (Totvs), Daniel Silveira (Avon), Túlio Oliveira (Mercado Pago), and Carlos Brandão (Iguá Saneamento). Marcelo Barbosa, President of the Brazilian Securities and Exchange Commission (CVM), Daniel Castanho, founder, and chairman of the board of Ânima Educação, Daniel Peres, founder of Tropix, an NFT digital art marketplace, to explore the metaverse, Ricardo Mussa, President of Raízen, and Ricardo Faria, an entrepreneur who is a major player in the country’s agribusiness sector, also joined the conversation. Last year, the founders of OpenCo, Sandro Reiss, and Rafael Pereira, the chairman of the board of GP Investimentos and G2D, also participated.
The program features prominent figures from the corporate and financial world for a relaxed conversation about the main challenges, lessons, and opportunities in the Brazilian market in their respective fields. The episodes can be viewed on EXAME’s YouTube channel and also on Spotify.
The program complements the content production of EXAME IN, EXAME’s digital business news boutique, which has also had a newsletter since March 2020 (sign up for free to receive it by email). Led by Graziella Valenti, the newsletter aims to provide access to information about the capital market, businesses, and startups.
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