2020 General Shareholders’ Meeting of Pacific SOGO Department Store

        Pacific SOGO Department Store (hereinafter referred to as "SOGO") held the 2020 general shareholders’ meeting on June 12. SOGO's net profit before tax last year was NT $950 million (the same below), an increase of 14%, and the net profit after tax was NT $490 million, an increase of 13%. In the whole year, the operating profit was maintained under the management of flat operating revenue and operating expenses. This year, the board of shareholders elected five directors and one supervisor. The new directors are Douglas Hsu, Sophia C.W. Huang, Huang Maode, Shaw y. Wang and Chee Ching. The supervisor is Wang Jingyi.

        Grab customer's heart service deepening and digital innovation

        Looking back on Taiwan's consumer market last year, although the momentum of consumption continued to increase, the export performance was not ideal. And with the impact of the general election year on the retail industry, the general performance was not as expected. In particular, department stores were affected by the e-commerce promotions in the double 11 in the fourth quarter, and the anniversary celebration of physical channels was greatly affected. SOGO closed its business last year due to the expiration of the lease of the Zhanqian store in Hsinchu, resulting in a negative growth of 1% in annual operating revenue and 2% in operating gross profit. However, the loss can be reduced after the closure of business, which was expected to contribute to the profit.

        In order to meet the needs of customers and improve the service quality, SOGO actively adjusted the store environment, products and brands. Last year, it adjusted 624 cabinets, accounting for 25% of the total brands, and launched creative marketing activities to enhance its competitiveness. In addition to continuing to develop new retail models, developing new businesses and pursuing commodity characteristics, SOGO also deepens segment marketing with VVIP / VIP, ThanQ、Wedding and other clubs to improve service level. Last year, SOGO newly established Premium club and Fresh club to manage different target customers to attract them. SOGO APP also went live in a new version last year, introducing HAPPYGO PAY for the first time, and adding intelligent parking discount, restaurant reservation, intelligent customer service, and other functions to lead customers to upgrade their digital life.

        Since the spring of this year, the global economy has been affected by the novel coronavirus epidemic. Although the epidemic situation in Taiwan is relatively mild, the number of people going to the shopping malls has decreased by 20-25%, which had a great impact on the first quarter of operation. SOGO adjusted its pace, accelerated the improvement of shopping mall environment and services, reversed digital innovation, established a strong core business type of each store, strengthened the experiential marketing, built a strategic team, and set up a Beauty club to manage the members, trying its best to build a smart retail ecosystem.

        Deep ploughing the corporate sustainability, internalization of core value

        In 2019, SOGO implemented the corporate sustainability with the "six key forces of sustainability " of innovative operation, high-quality goods, moving service, happy workplace, caring platform and sustainable environment, and took the green department store, the new tableware age 4.0 and the sustainable public welfare chain as the annual key plan, becoming the first winner in department store industry in Taiwan to win the Global Views’ “Enterprise Social Responsibility Award" model award. And it won Asia Responsible Entrepreneurship Awards for three times. Since the first year of SOGO CSR (2015), deep ploughing the corporate sustainability not only makes SOGO the leading position in the department store industry and helped it win 64 CSR awards at home and abroad, but also successfully shaped the image of "CSR model of department store industry" and became a brand deeply trusted by customers.

        In the future, SOGO will give full play to the Japanism, show high-quality service and professional spirit, combine with the implementation of Taiwan's experience, establish a new intelligent store, and work hard to practice the sustainability of the enterprise, actively innovate and grow with advanced thinking to meet future challenges. Wei