Change is afoot in the luxury industry. Fewer than 5 weeks into 2017 and several luxury firms’ CEOs have left or are leaving. It is just days since we heard that Chloe Creative Director Clare Wright Keller in Richemont was to quit and while I was writing this piece, Riccardo Tisci’s departure from Givenchy was announced.
While LVMH issued a warning, Ralph Lauren maintains its earnings guidance, even though the share price dropped on the news that Stefan Larsson is leaving.
These creative and corporate developments are taking place against the backdrop of geopolitical uncertainty and also markets behaving exuberantly as if the stock market is somehow decoupled from the economic and political sentiment.
This may well be the year of reckoning for the luxury sector.
Luxury brands have too long dithered between their exclusive image and the effect of the democratic nature of the web. The digital consumer expects luxury brands to navigate the fine line between customising the experience for the consumer, because she is known to them but without becoming too familiar and intrusive. As various privacy related issues rear their head, and cultural expectations diverge, the problem becomes more challenging for luxury brands.
As “things” became more accessible, the pendulum swung towards exclusive “experiences” although this year is seeing the rise of the tangible, as Rebecca Robins, author of Meta-Luxury, says highlighting the resurgence of print books as well as millennials choosing Smythson and Moleskine notebooks to start their 2017.
The intangible and the physical however must both make money, retaining the interest and loyalty of customers across the demographic especially as millennials aren’t as broke as previously assumed.
When Larsson joined Ralph Lauren, its eponymous founder became chief creative officer stepping away from his CEO role, signalling the separation of creative from corporate, as it were. Differences over strategy is the given reason for Larsson’s departure.
Frankly this really isn’t the time for corporate and creative to cleave.
This is the time for corporate and creative to coalesce and pore collaboratively over the information contained both in the yottabytes of “big data” coming in from the many social media channels and consumer created content, as well as the “small data” that the brand’s heritage has yielded over the years.
This is the time for finding meaning in both of those and layering it with the essence of the luxury brand, to remain relevant in these times of change.
This is the time for the luxury sector — corporate and creative — to finally reckon with technology and find a new narrative of relevance that brings the sector in step with the times.
This is the time for creative and corporate leadership to reject Draytonesque kissing and parting, and choose Donne-like commitment to rejuvenate luxury’s relevance.