(Founder and Chief of LVMH, Bernard Arnault)
Apparently, Bernard Arnault isn’t worried about the recent boycott of LVMH that’s spread across cyber space through Chinese blogs, chat rooms and discussion forums. The Cyber Boycott includes not only Louis Vuitton handbags and accessories, but all 60 companies owned and operated by LVMH including Christian Dior, Tag Heuer, Fendi, Marc Jacobs, etc. So far, over 20 million people have signed online petitions to join the boycott. (Read more here: NYT)
China is Louis Vuitton’s third largest market (behind Japan and the USA)… but Arnault said in Le Figaro, “The consequences for our company are very limited”. (Read more here: Forbes)
(Picture Credit: Patrick Kovarik for the New York Times)
The boycott stems from not only the little debacle as the Olympic torch worked its way through Paris, April 8 but general Western support of Tibet. Protesters for Human Rights and Tibetan freedom actually managed to extinguish the flame a few times in the scuffle.
Arnault actually said in response to the torch incident, “If we want to have dialogues with China, the Olympic torch should not have been a target of attacks when it passed Western cities… boycotting the Olympics is not a solution.”
