Investigation“Successions” (2/6). For Bernard Arnault, 72, boss of LVMH, the transfer of power has always been a crucial issue. He strictly supervised the education of his five children, who, while waiting for him to decide which one will be able to take his place, are cutting their teeth within the paternal group.
Every month, six of them meet around the table, in one of the lounges on the ninth and last floor of 22 avenue Montaigne, headquarters of LVMH. The five children from two marriages – Delphine, Antoine, Alexandre, Frédéric and Jean – surround their father, Bernard Arnault. They look so much alike: tall, slender, high forehead, clear eyes, all perfectly polite, with that impeccable look composed thanks to the brands of the group – Dior, Vuitton, Berluti, etc. – which always give them the appearance of coming out of the dry cleaner.
These six talk to each other several times a day. Most of them live next to each other, in the chic districts of Paris. They run into each other regularly in fashion shows, and there is always one of the brothers, or their sister, to accompany the father, owner and CEO of the world’s number one luxury industry, on his weekly shopping tour. Avenue Montaigne, Bon Marché or La Samaritaine, finally renovated. The monthly meeting at headquarters, however, is of a special kind. It holds both the family lunch and the mini-board of directors and, above all, a top-flight course in doing business.
Antoine Arnault, 44, the eldest of the boys, with a velvety look and a three-day-old beard, anxious to humanize the image of the clan, does not quite present it like that, of course. “It’s an opportunity to meet up and tell each other about our lives …”, he minimizes. His father himself rectifies, however, without make-up: “Don’t tell each other stories, we mainly talk about the group’s issues. “ It is he, moreover, who draws up every month on his Ipad, with his usual chilling rigor, the agenda for this lunch. The meal, necessarily dietary, should not last more than an hour and a half. The appointment of a designer, the opening of a boutique, the purchase of a brand… The patriarch submits everything to the judgment of his children, distributing the floor to everyone.
“Our father, our boss”
“Make no mistake about it, specifies Jean, the youngest, who has barely finished his studies and is preparing to join the group like his elders, in the end, it is always he who decides. “ The five heirs cut their teeth in front of their father, as young lions would learn to hunt before the king of the clan, before one day he decides which one will take his place. Alexandre, this “number three”, who has trouble masking his appetite for conquest, sums up in one sentence this funny mix between blood ties and business: “He’s our father, of course, but also our boss. “
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