THE END OF EUROPEAN LUXURY BRANDS?
Already today more than 30 percent of global luxury purchases are performed by Chinese. A couple of years ago, Bain and Altagamma reported even bigger figures for Milan and Paris, with over 50 percent of sales to Chinese. With more and more brands reaching out and collaborating with Chinese Designers, which goes well beyond localizations, signs are evident that we are getting much closer to the appearance of globally-relevant luxury and lifestyle designer brands that originate from China. At the same time, in Europe and in the world's leading US market, we are experiencing the transition to the next generation with substantial different perspectives on luxury brands. Millenials and the maturity of Chinese luxury customers - those two effects combined will radically reshape the brand landscape in the next 7 to 10 years. The classical brand-management approaches will not work anymore. Few brands seem to have the right level of transformational leadership and the important back-up of their boards in order to initiate the fundamental transformation of their brands. Trying to "stabilize" the past or present creates actually far more risk than deciding for a courageous transformation. Pretty counter-intuitive.