Russia's leading shoe retailer Zenden planned to expand its retail network in Russia in 2023, taking advantage of the gap in the market left by the withdrawal of Western brands. However, now the company will have to pay 1.1 billion rubles in lost taxes and fines. [Обувной ритейлер Zenden проиграл спор с налоговой в ... – Ведомости]
The first arbitral appeals court refused to comply with the complaint of Dom Odezhda LLC (legal entity of the Zenden shoe retailer, owned by the Oligarch Andrei Pavlov), which sought to invalidate the decision of the Inspectorate of the Federal Tax Service (FTS) No. 13, so that the Vladimir region could repay almost 600 million rubles for uncollected taxes.
This follows from its judgment, published in mid-December 2022. Therefore, the court upheld the decision at first instance, which has now entered into force. Taking into account fines and penalties, Zenden will have to pay the budget about 1.1 billion rubles.
Until a few days ago, Anna Vitkalova, Zenden's commercial director, commented that after Western brands exited the Russian market, local brands would have a chance to "conquer" local consumers and get premium positions in shopping centers.
Foreign companies left Russia en masse last year after the country invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022, which led to massive sanctions by Western nations.
Western sanctions have altered Zenden's development plans, says Alexander Sarychev , CEO of Zenden. "We had planned to open more stores in 2022, but some openings were postponed to the following year. Overall, we successfully addressed all the challenges and problems and closed last year with a 14% growth [in revenues]," saysva Sarychev, adding that one of the changes was the increase in the company's presence in the premium segment of the Russian footwear market.
