The luxury sector has weathered previous crises better than others, but the coronavirus pandemic shows little optimistic data, with a drop in sales of around 25%. Xandra Falcó, daughter of Carlos Falcó, who died of coronavirus, has since yesterday relieved her father as president of Círculo Fortuny, a non-profit association that unites high-end and luxury brands. He takes command with the intention of promoting the online channel and believes that this is a year of transition in which, despite the situation, there will be opportunities for Spain.

How do you face this stage? Take over from your father ... Substituting for my father has a powerful emotional charge, this is challenging and something I believe in. The moment is hard and a drop of between 20% and 25% is expected in a realistic scenario in which there are trips, and up to 35% in a worse context. The situation is complicated. Luxury in Spain represents 10% of the total sector in Europe. In turn, European high-end companies are 72% of the world total. Europe, therefore, is the Silicon Valley of luxury, so this moment is a great opportunity for Spain to reposition itself with respect to other more famous powers, such as Italy or France. What is your plan, taking into account the context, so that the sector goes back? One of the focuses is to promote the online channel. If it was growing before, during the crisis it has grown even more. That digital transformation, dubbed "figital" (a word that unites physical and digital) has to be done and the Círculo Fortuny can help bring gurus to help brands make that change. The Chinese market is vital for luxury, but Chinese tourists will not be able to come to Spain in the medium term. It is expected that 50% of clients in the world of luxury will be Chinese. Spain only receives 13% of this elite tourist. But now he has to prepare himself for the image he can give there, to be seen as a distributor of excellence. You have to bet on it. This has to be a year of transition and of preparing for the future, for 2021 and 2022.The closing of borders does not help tourists to arrive ... Tourism will be a minority and we hope that it will recover in 2021, to return to the 2019 figures in 2022 and 2023. It will be a tough window, but it is an opportunity to reposition Spain as a destination of excellence. There is a local Chinese market, which buys there. In other crises, luxury has survived better than other sectors. Do you think the same will happen with the current one? No, because the figures we see are of sharp falls. There has been nothing similar or there is no precedent for this, because, unlike other crises, the problem is that there has been no consumption because the stores were closed. Madrid and Barcelona have been the sensitive areas of the pandemic and are precisely the focus of the luxury tourism. What is the impact? These cities will be the most affected by shopping tourism and will take the longest to recover. It will be a difficult year and everything will depend on whether international travel is allowed and tourism opens soon. It is necessary to see how the fourth quarter evolves based on all this. Will the fact that the opening of foreign tourism is later than in other countries affect the recovery? In shopping tourism we have been late compared to other countries, despite that we are a tourist power. Luxury tourism is one of the things that the authorities should agree to promote because it generates added value. We must do our homework so that, when flights are allowed, we are prepared. Does the sector give up on the tourist season when it comes to luxury shopping? The problem is that to give an excellent service you cannot open halfway. In a luxury hotel you have to give complete customer service. I do not know how much it will be able to recover, because it is too early to give figures. One of the factors in the recovery will be hygiene measures and here the luxury is well prepared, because the shops and establishments are usually larger and with fewer people. The luxury will be adapted to give a better service to the clients in this sense.

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