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Burberry, the brand best known for its iconic checkered pattern and fashionable trench coat, announced Wednesday that it may cut around 1,700 jobs worldwide in a major cost-reducing effort. The news comes as British luxury brand reported a staggering 117% drop in annual profits, or around $87.8M (66m), over the last financial year. Burberry employed about 9,300 people across the world last year, meaning the cuts could take out about 20% of the brand’s workforce. In a statement on the companys website, CEO Joshua Schulman said Burberry is not looking to make any major store closures, and explained that the cuts will primarily come from the group’s head offices and the reorganization of in-store duties. It will also drop the entire nighttime shift at its trench coat factory in Castleford. “For a long time we have had overcapacity at that facility, and that is simply not sustainable,” Schulman said of the Castleford cuts, per the announcement. “But I want to be very clear that we are making this change to safeguard our UK manufacturing, and in fact we will be making a significant investment to renovate this factory in the second half.” While the layoffs are a major move for Burberry, it’s not the first of its recent cost-saving initiatives. In November of 2024, it announced a $53.2M (40m) cost-savings program. Last July, the struggling company replaced CEO Jonathan Akeroyd after just two years in the role, in hopes of resuscitation. Amid price hikes, inflation, and an uncertain economy, customers have tightened their purse strings, and demand for luxury goods has been falling. Burberry is not the only luxury brand making tough choices. Tapestry, the parent company of Stuart Weitzman, Coach, and Kate Spade nearly acquired Capri, the owner of Michael Kors, Versace, and Jimmy Choo last year, in an effort to revive the struggling brands. In its 2025 third quarter fiscal results, revenue decreased by 11.6% on a reported basis and 11.4% in constant currency. At the time, John D. Idol, the company’s chairman and chief executive officer, said, “Overall our business remained challenged during the quarter and we were disappointed with our results. We are reevaluating our strategic initiatives to improve current sales trends. Looking ahead, we expect our performance to improve throughout fiscal year 2026 positioning us to return to growth in fiscal 2027 and beyond.” In January, founder and editor-in-chief of The Business of Fashion, Imran Amed, also spoke to the immense struggles luxury fashion brands are facing in modern times. “This is probably the most severe crisis that Ive seen on the luxury side of the fashion industry since the Great Recession of 20082009, after the collapse of the global financial system when everything almost fell apart everywhere,” Amed said. In Wednesday’s announcement, Schulman said Burberry may continue to see room for improvement even as they cut workforce numbers. “We are still in the early stages of our turnaround,” he said. “The current macroeconomic environment has become more uncertain in light of geopolitical developments.”
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Where you work affects your risk of dying by suicide. For example, loggers, musicians and workers in the oil and gas industries have much higher rates of suicide than the rest of the population. But on the flip side, some professions have very low rates of suicide. One of them is education. National and state data shows that educators in the U.S., including teachers, professors and librarians, are among the least likely to die by suicide. Were a team of researchers at the Center for Violence Prevention and Community Safety at Arizona State University. We manage Arizonas Violent Death Reporting System, part of a surveillance system sponsored by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention with counterparts in all 50 U.S. states, Washington D.C., and Puerto Rico. We collect data on violent deaths, including suicide, thanks to agreements with local medical examiners and law enforcement. When public health researchers like us look at suicide data, we often focus on high-risk populations to learn where intervention and prevention are most needed. But we can learn from low-risk populations such as educators too. Why some professions have higher suicide rates Over the past 25 years, the suicide rate in the U.S. has increased significantly. The age-adjusted rate in 2022 was 14.2 suicides per 100,000 people, up from 10.9 a little over two decades earlier, according to the National Center for Health Statistics. Epidemiologists often adjust data for age to allow for a fairer comparison of incidence rates across populations with different age distributions. But not all populations are affected equally. For example, military veterans die by suicide at higher rates than civilians, as do men, older adults and American Indian and Alaska Natives, to name a few demographics. In 2022 the suicide rate for men, for instance, was 23 suicides per 100,000, versus 5.9 for women. The rate of suicide among the working-age population is also growing. Over the past two decades it has increased by 33%, reaching a rate of 32 suicides per 100,000 for men and eight for women in 2021. And workers in certain occupations are at higher risk of dying by suicide than others. The reasons why are complex and diverse. Workers in construction, an industry with some of the highest suicide rates, may face greater stigma getting help for mental health issues, while people in other fields such as law enforcement may be more exposed to traumatic experiences, which can harm their mental health. In short, some explanations are directly tied to ones work, such as having low job security, little autonomy or agency, and an imbalance of work efforts and rewards. Other factors are more indirect, such as an occupations demographic makeup or the type of personality that chooses a profession. Together, factors like these help explain the rate of suicide across occupations. Teachers, professors and librarians Educators, on the other hand, have relatively little suicide risk. By educators, we mean workers classified by the Bureau of Labor Statistics as educational instruction and library, which includes teachers, tutors, professors, librarians and similar occupations. Nationally, about 11 in 100,000 male educators died by suicide in 2021, with the figure for women being about half that, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. By contrast, the rate for male workers in arts, design, entertainment, sports and media was 44.5 suicides per 100,000, and the rate for male workers in construction and extraction was 65.6. Data from our state of Arizona follows the same pattern. From 2016 through 2023, a total of 117 educators died by suicide, mostly primary and secondary school teachers. This works out to be an incidence rate of 7.3 suicides per 100,000 educators one-third the rate for all Arizona workers and the lowest among all occupations in the state. Why educators have a low suicide rate So why are educators at such a low risk of suicide? After all, educational professions certainly present their own challenges. For example, many teachers experience high amounts of burnout, which can cause physical and mental health problems such as headaches, fatigue, anxiety and depression. A good place to begin is the professions demographic composition. A disproportionately high share of educators are women or are married traits associated with lower suicide rates. Educators also tend to have high educational attainment, which may indirectly protect against suicide by increasing socioeconomic status and employability. Another factor is workplace environment. Workplaces that offer increased access to lethal means such as firearms and medications are associated with higher suicide rates. This helps explain why workers in law enforcement, medical professions and the military tend to show high rates. The comparatively low availability of lethal means in schools may help keep educators rates low. In addition, eductors workplaces, typically schools and campuses, offer rich opportunities to form strong social relationships, which improve ones overall health and help workers cope with job stress. The unique, meaningful bonds many educators form with their students, administrators and fellow educators may offer support that enhances their mental health. Finally, based on more contextual information in our Arizona database, we found that a lower proportion of educators who died by suicide had an alcohol or drug abuse problem. Alcohol or substance abuse problems can increase suicidal ideation and other work-related risk factors such as job insecurity and work-related injury. In short, educators may live a healthier lifestyle compared with some other workers. Improving worker health So, what can workers and employers in other professions learn from this, and how can we improve worker health? One lesson is to develop skills to cope with job stress. All professions are capable of producing stress, which can negatively affect a persons mental and physical health. Identifying the root cause of job stress and applying coping skills, such as positive thinking, meditation and goal-setting, can have beneficial effects. Developing a social network at the workplace is also key. High-quality social relationships can improve health to a degree on par with quitting smoking. Social relationships provide tangible and intangible support and help establish ones sense of purpose and identity. This applies outside the workplace, too. So promoting work-life balance is one way organizations can help their employees. Organizations can also strive to foster a positive workplace culture. One aspect of such a culture is establishing a sense of meaning or purpose in the work. For educators, this feature may help offset some of the professions challenges. Other aspects include appreciating employees for their hard work, identifying and magnifying employee strengths, and not creating a toxic workplace. It is worth noting that continued research on occupational health is important. In the context of educators, more research is needed to understand how risk differs between and within specific groups. Despite their overall low risk, no person or demographic is immune to suicide, and every suicide is preventable. If you or someone you know is experiencing signs of crisis, the free and confidential 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline is available to call, text or chat. Jordan Batchelor is a research analyst at the Center for Violence Prevention and Community Safety at Arizona State University. Charles Max Katz is a director of the Center for Violence Prevention and Community Safety at Arizona State University. Taylor Cox is a program coordinator at the School of Criminology & Criminal Justice at Arizona State University. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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E-Commerce
Japanese technology and entertainment company Sony logged an 18% rise in profit for the fiscal year through March on healthy results at its music and video-game operations.Its chief executive, Hiroki Totoki, outlined the company’s strategy for growth Wednesday, stressing that collaboration among Sony Corp.’s various segments, like animation and music, were crucial to deliver the “kando,” or emotional engagement, that lies at the core of the company’s vision and strength.“Building on our momentum and results to date and working with a laser-like focus to realize our long-term Creative Entertainment Vision will be at the core of our corporate strategies moving forward,” he told reporters.Sony’s movies division has strong offerings in the pipeline, including Spider-Man films and biopics about The Beatles, while animation remains a driver of growth centered around the popular anime streaming service Crunchyroll, Totoki said.Tokyo-based Sony reported a record annual profit of 1.14 trillion yen ($7.8 billion), up from 970.6 billion yen in the previous fiscal year. Annual sales were virtually unchanged, inching down to 12.957 trillion yen ($88 billion) from 13.020 trillion yen.One area that lagged among Sony’s sprawling businesses was the financial segment, where revenue stalled. But its film division and its imaging and sensor solutions segment did well.Sony officials said they were studying how to respond to President Donald Trump’s tariffs, although that was a challenge because of uncertainties and constant changes. But they said the negative impact from U.S. trade policy will be kept to 10% of Sony’s operating profit in the coming fiscal year by adjusting the allocation of shipments, among other measures.Totoki stressed that Sony plans to leverage its content creating technology, like virtual reality and image sensors, to feed into its entertainment products, including working on immersive experiences. Sony also has powerful collaborative relations with various entertainment companies like Kadokawa, which includes publishing as well as films and animation, and Bandai Namco, a video game maker, he added.Sony will emphasize the “diversity” of its workers, helping bring out people’s creative potential, Totoki said.Among the Sony movies that fared well at the box office for the fiscal year through March were “Venom: The Last Dance,” featuring the Marvel Comics superhero, and “Bad Boys: Ride or Die,” an action comedy, where Will Smith and Martin Lawrence return in their popular cop roles in the fourth installment in the series.Sony, which makes the PlayStation console and game software played on that machine, also posted healthy results in the gaming business.Its music operations, which also held up, include recordings, streaming services and music for games. The top-selling recorded music projects for the latest fiscal year globally was SZA’s “SOS Deluxe: LANA,” followed by Beyonce, Future & Metro Boomin and Travis Scott.The top seller in its Japan music business was Kenshi Yonezu’s “Lost Corner” album, followed by offerings from Stray Kids and Six Tones.For the January-March quarter, Sony posted a 197.7 billion yen ($1.3 billion) profit, up 5% from 189 billion yen the same quarter in the previous fiscal year. Sales were 2.6 trillion yen ($17.7 billion), down 24% from 3.48 trillion yen.Sony is forecasting a nearly 13% drop in profit for the fiscal year through March 2026, to 930 billion yen ($6.3 billion), on 11.7 trillion yen ($80 billion) sales, down 2.9% on-year.Sony Group Corp. stocks, which fell in Tokyo morning trading, rebounded to finish 3.7% higher after its financial results were announced. Yuri Kageyama is on Threads: https://www.threads.com/@yurikageyama Yuri Kageyama, AP Business Writer
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