Nobody's Perfect - Luxury Snapshots
On LVMH weaknesses, who is Michael Burke, Richemont resilience and flaws, Burberry, Ferragamo and Gucci downward spiralling, and are you a boiling frog?
Nobody’s perfect…this is very clear.
Fashion is cyclical. True.
But these cannot be taken as excuses for bad or incautious management.
It’s easy to grow when everybody grows the business, when there is plenty of Chinese customers buying fashion and luxury products, when you raise prices and clients are happy anyway to spend their money on your plastic or meaningless products.
Then, at a certain point, when things slow down, when customers change their behaviors because they earn not enough money and inflation is roaring, it’s only at this point that the stress test for your brand management starts.
Following the hangover pre and post pandemia, fashion and luxury brands seem to be unprepared to this new chapter of the industry story.
As I wrote in my book “Luxury Unlocked. The keys to mastering luxury brands in a disrupted age”, “luxury business with China seemed like a Lamborghini launched at full speed. Pity that the road started to be curvy and bumpy”
LVMH - is it a giant with clay feet?
The first luxury group in the world is not immune to the 2024 Armageddon.