"In the past two or three months, things are already recovering - faster than Europe," said Wolfram Hail, Esprit's president for Asia Pacific."We're quite optimistic."
Sales in the Asia Pacific region started improving in July, and August was better than July, Hail said.
"I hope that things will further improve, and by [January] they will look much brighter. Will we be back to the heyday of 2007? Maybe not. But there's a lot of disposable income around."
Hail noted the global financial crisis hit Asia later than the rest of the world. "Asia tends to be hit harder, but the impact lasts for a shorter period," he said.
"Our business did suffer, yes, but it didn't suffer in a really bad way. The markets were very resilient."
Esprit's joint venture in the mainland will continue to grow revenue at a double-digit pace this year, said Hail, who aims to increase the proportion of revenue that Esprit earns from the Asia Pacific region to 20 percent from the present 14 percent within three to five years. Currently, Esprit derives more than 85 percent of its total revenues from its European markets.
The Asia-Pacific region could contribute one-third of revenue within ten years, he said.
"The objective is to increase the share of Asia Pacific business significantly over the years," Hail said, and Esprit plans to open a "couple dozen" new stores in the region this year.
Hail will focus his energies this year on Australia, Singapore and Taiwan.
In Hong Kong, a new flagship store will open soon in Tsim Sha Tsui, while two or three smaller stores will be shut as leases run out.
Esprit's wholesale business in Asia held firm year on year, beating management expectations of a shrinking order book. "We were able to keep our wholesale business intact," Hail he said.
