At the press conference for reporting its fiscal first-half business performance, Atsushi Suzuki, President and Representative Director of H2O Retailing Corporation, expressed his intention of carefully handling the name of the Sogo Kobe store.
In the business alliance with Seven & i Holdings Co., Ltd., H2O Retailing is to take over the business of Sogo Kobe, Seibu Takatsuki and Sogo Seishin stores in the Kansai area from Sogo & Seibu Co., Ltd.
According to President Suzuki, Sogo Kobe has been supported by the citizens of Kobe for many years. The company has no plan to restructure the Sogo Kobe store at the moment, and employees will continue to be hired.
The S Point point program implemented by the H2O Group is to be introduced in the stores of Seven-Eleven Japan Co., Ltd. in the Kansai area in the spring of 2018. There are more than 2,000 Seven-Eleven stores in the Kansai area, and H2O Group cardholders number 7.5 million.
H2O Retailing reported that its consolidated sales during the first half of the current fiscal year (April-September 2016) decreased to 433,539 million yen from 441,425 million yen in the year before. Operating profits declined to 6,623 million yen from 7,555 million yen, and net profits to 6,552 million yen from 6,327 million yen.