Ryohin Keikaku's operating profit jumps 40% to a record, led by overseas growth as Japan keeps pace with its peers

Ryohin Keikaku Co., Ltd. (株式会社良品計画), the company behind the MUJI (無印良品) brand, reported record revenue and profit at every level for the year ended 31 August 2026, according to an earnings statement filed 14 October. Operating revenue rose 17.7% to ¥923.6 billion and operating profit rose 40.1% to ¥103.4 billion, the first time the company's operating profit has passed ¥100 billion; its operating margin climbed to 11.2% from 9.4% a year earlier. Ordinary profit rose 44.8% to ¥104.7 billion, and net profit attributable to shareholders rose 50.3% to ¥76.4 billion, the company said.

Ryohin Keikaku attributed the growth to expansion of its overseas business and a weaker yen, together with lower costs from bringing more production in-house and holding back on discounting, which it said widened its gross margin. Net profit was lifted further by foreign-exchange gains, a gain on the sale of cross-held shares, and the recognition of deferred tax assets at overseas subsidiaries based on their expected future taxable income, the company said.

MUJI-brand stores, including licensed locations, totalled 1,486 at the fiscal year-end: 723 in Japan, after 50 openings and 10 closures, and 763 overseas, after 71 openings and 37 closures concentrated in East Asia and Southeast Asia/Oceania, Ryohin Keikaku said. The company also said it resumed new store openings in North America during the year.

Overseas carries the headline

The domestic business grew revenue 8.7% to ¥511.0 billion and segment profit 21.6% to ¥63.4 billion. Ryohin Keikaku attributed the gain to new stores and seasonal promotions, including its "MUJI Week" members' discount campaign (無印良品週間), a New Year sale and a "GOOD POINT WEEK" campaign offering five times the usual loyalty points, alongside cost reductions from in-house production and more efficient store operations. Existing-store sales grew, the company said, though e-commerce sales fell behind the prior year after a system outage earlier in the fiscal year; the two channels combined still rose.

Every overseas segment grew faster. East Asia, the company's second-largest segment, grew revenue 32.2% to ¥293.8 billion and segment profit 44.2% to ¥61.7 billion, led by sales growth across every department in mainland China, lifestyle goods and food in particular, with Taiwan, Hong Kong and South Korea also posting higher revenue and profit. Southeast Asia and Oceania grew revenue 32.8% to ¥66.5 billion and segment profit 64.1% to ¥9.2 billion, aided by improved store layouts, revised sales plans and new stores, including flagship openings in Thailand and Vietnam. Europe and the US grew revenue 24.1% to ¥52.3 billion and segment profit 17.0% to ¥8.1 billion, as strong existing-store and online sales outweighed upfront costs for a European flagship store due to open in the new fiscal year.

The read

Domestic growth of 8.7% comfortably beat the cost of living. Consumer prices rose 1.9% in August 2026, the fiscal year's final month, according to Japan's Statistics Bureau, though a single month's reading is only a rough guide to a result covering the full twelve months. Measured against the rest of the sector, it looks less exceptional: among the other large retailers floortok tracks in its earnings room, each reporting its own latest period, revenue growth has a median of about 10%, and of the five that disclose a separate Japan or domestic sales line, the median growth is about 8%. That puts Ryohin Keikaku's domestic business almost exactly in the middle of that group rather than standing out.

The group's 17.7% revenue growth and 40.1% profit growth are, in other words, mostly an overseas story, and the company itself credits the weaker yen alongside its overseas expansion. In our view, that makes the domestic line, not the headline, the better guide to how MUJI is faring with Japanese shoppers: solid, and in step with the sector rather than ahead of it.

For the year to August 2027, Ryohin Keikaku forecast revenue of ¥1,014.0 billion, up 9.8% and above ¥1 trillion for the first time, with operating profit up 10.2% to ¥114.0 billion, ordinary profit up 6.0% to ¥111.0 billion and net profit down 4.5% to ¥73.0 billion. The company attributed the net-profit decline to the reversal of the one-off gains, including the share-sale and tax items, that lifted this year's figure. If achieved, revenue and operating profit would both set records for a fourth consecutive year, the company said.

Ryohin Keikaku said it would pay a year-end dividend of ¥22 per share, raising the full-year payout for the year just ended to ¥38 from the ¥32 it had previously forecast. Adjusted for the two-for-one stock split that took effect on 1 September 2025, the prior year's dividend was ¥25, the company said. It forecast an unchanged ¥38 annual dividend for the new fiscal year.