Japanese sports fashion brand Descente will close down 47 independent outlets for kids wear in South Korea as sales remained sluggish amid lingering disapproval of Japanese brand since last year’s trade tensions on top of COVID-19 setback.

Descente Korea will shut down 47 ‘Young Athlete’ outlets operating exclusively for selling clothing and accessories for children aged between eight and 13 at the nation’s major department stores and malls, according to industry sources on Wednesday. An official from the company said it will run the shops just until August and integrate the kids’ lineups with its general stores.

Since the entry into the Korean market in 2000, the Japanese label has gained huge popularity from young people in their teens and 20s. After being picked as one of the favorite brands by teenage boys, it launched Young Athlete brand in August 2016 and opened exclusive stores for kids wear in 2018. Market analysts estimate its Young Athlete lines generated revenue of around 20 billion won ($16.2 million) in 2019.

But the company began facing unexpected setback last year when the anti-Japanese sentiment over Seoul and Tokyo’s conflicts led to Korean consumers’ boycott movement against Japanese goods and services. According to the Financial Supervisory Service, Descente Korea posted an 87 percent on-year plunge in operating profit in 2019 to 9 billion won and sales dipped 15 percent to 615.6 billion won.

Other Japanese fashion labels are also having a hard time in the country with a double whammy from the COVID-19 shutdowns.

GU, a budget brand under Japanese fast-fashion giant Uniqlo, said last week that it would pull out all of the three offline stores, in just less than two years since it was launched in Korea in September 2018. Uniqlo also shuttered 13 outlets from February to May, bringing down the number of stores in Korea from 188 to 175 as of May 29.

By Lee Yoon-jae and Choi Mira

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