LVMH: Bernard Arnault Success story and Biography
LVMH owner Bernard Arnault surpassed the founder of Amazon Jeff Bezos in the list of world's richest person. Bernard Arnault & family outranked Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg as per forbes real time billionaires list.
What is the story behind the success of Bernard Arnault? How is his multinational corporation LVMH doing so well? We will know about that in this article. I hope the success story of Bernard Arnault will inspire you a lot to gain success in your life.
Who is Bernard Arnault?
72 years old Bernard Arnault is the richest person in the world who is a French investor, businessman, and CEO of the luxury goods company LVMH. Recently he has overtaken the title of fellow billionaire Jeff Bezos.
This is a great achievement for Bernard Arnault and his family.
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Bernard Arnault was born to an industrial family in Roubaix, a city in the North of France on the 5th of March 1949. Bernard Jean Etienne Arnault is the full name of Bernard. His father's name is Jean Leon Arnault who was a manufacturer and owned a civil engineering company, Ferret-Savinel.
His school was Maxence Van Der Meersch High School in Roubaix. After completing his School education, he finished his graduation from the Prestigious Ecole Polytechnique in engineering in 1971.
In 1991 he married a Canadian concert pianist named Helene Mercier. But it was his second marriage. He has two children from his 1st marriage and three from his 2nd. Four of Arnault's five children work in different corners of the LVMH: Frédéric, Delphine, Antoine and Alexandre.
Bernard Arnault quoted himself in a tweet as a competitive and winning person. That tweet portrays him better from his current position in the world.
The tweet was-
“I am very competitive. I always want to win.”
What is LVMH?
LVMH stands for Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton (OTC: LVMUY). This company is commonly referred to as LVMH or Louis Vuitton to the people of the world.
LVMH is the world’s leading luxury products group which is basically a family group founded in 1987 in French by the merger of the renowned fashion house Louis Vuitton and wines and spirits company Moët Hennessy.
Bernard Arnault is the existing Chairman and CEO of LVMH company . The headquarters of the company is in Paris, France.
At present, 75 brands in 6 business groups are included in LVMH. The groups are: Wines & Spirits; Fashion & Leather Goods, Perfumes & Cosmetics, Watches & Jewelry, Selective Retailing, and Other Activities. The famous brands of these business groups are Fendi, Givenchy, TAG Heuer, and many more.
LVMH became the most valuable company in Europe in 2021 with a valuation of €329 billion (Source: Wikipedia).
Success story of Bernard Arnault
Bernard Arnault started his career as an engineer within the family’s construction business after completing his engineering degree in 1971. He planned for the company to expand its scopes and be involved in other more profitable businesses.
He convinced his father to gain benefits by dismissing the construction division. Eight years later he changed the company name Ferret-Savinel to Ferinel Inc and moved its focus to real estate. This was his first successful action to move forward and became quite successful in the real estate business.
After working successfully in the family business for around seven years, Arnault became the the director of development in the year 1974 and then CEO in 1977 and surpassed his father by becoming president in 1979.
In the year 1981, the French Socialists forced the family to move to America and there was also an opportunity to expand their real estate business to the US. That’s why Arnault returned to France in the year 1983 and the real success story started from here.
When the firm Boussac Saint-Freres was bankrupt Arnault got a golden opportunity to expand into the textile industry. With $15 million of his own money and co-operated with Antonie Bernheim, a managing partner who worked for an investment firm called Lazard Freres raised the $80 million necessary to purchase Boussac Saint Freres.
Arnault is very long-sighted. He realized the potential of one brand Christian Dior. For that reason after buying the company he sold most of the shares and kept only two company- 1) the Christian Dior brand and 2) the department store Le Bon Marche. Doing hard-work he established a profitable business from scratch and became the CEO of Dior in 1985.
Arnault was invited to invest in the LVMH company in 1987 and finally chose to invest in a joint share with the Guinness PLC. After gaining more of the company by continuous investing he had control of 43.5% of the company shares. Then immediately built a strong team by replacing old average employees to get better output.
One of the strategies of Bernard Arnault to focus only on its luxury goods. The strong point of his success is to begin an aggressive acquisition campaign to acquire other luxury brand companies including ‘Marc Jacobs’, ‘Sephora’, and ‘Guerlain’ and a few others. In January 2021 LVMH completed the acquisition of Tiffany & Co. (NYSE: TIF), the global luxury jeweler.
By this acquisition strategy LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton has successfully positioned itself as the world’s leading luxury brand.
Continuous success of Bernard Arnault
The success of Bernard Arnault is constant. His brands continue to be famous across the world and his company continues to create innovative products that people truly find very attractive.
The success graph of Arnault continues to grow as the demand for luxury goods continues to flow in growing markets like China, Japan, and other Asian countries.
With the roll of LVMH’s profit, Bernard Arnault has once again reached the top position as the richest man in the world.
Bernard Arnault Net worth
We are all interested in net worth, right? Here have a look at Bernard Arnault net worth.
Being the Principal shareholder in the fashion company LVMH he has become the wealthiest man in France and is among the richest in the world.
Arnault net worth is near to $197.5 Billion (Source: Forbes billionaires list) as of 2021.
In June of 2019, Bernard Arnault’s net worth was $ 100 billion for the first time. That time he was the third richest person on the planet. In July 2019, his net worth exceeded $108 billion which positioned him as the second richest person on the planet roughly $400 billion ahead of Bill Gates.
But the present net worth makes Bernard Arnault the richest person in the world.
How did Bernard Arnault become the world’s richest man?
Arnault had earlier become the world's richest person in December 2019 and January 2020. He becomes the world’s richest person again from May 2021. And he holds his position till now.
According to the latest rankings, Bezos's net worth stood at $193.3 billion while Tesla and SpaceX chief Elon Musk is placed third at $182.1 billion. Bill Gates is at fourth position in this billionaires list with his estimated worth of $132.1 billion.
Arnault left behind Elon Musk when the company announced first-quarter revenue of 14 euros billion in 2021, which surged by 32 per cent as compared to the first quarter of 2020.
As per Forbes’ real time billionaires list, Bernard Arnault is at the top position bypassing Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos in 2021. This change in the ranking is simply due to LVMH’s stock price soared from 3378.9 EUR (a year) to 655.60 EUR (this week). This brought about a huge rise of Arnault’s destiny, which grew by over $110 billion in the past 14 months.
This becomes possible for the hard-work, intelligence and persistence of Bernard Arnault. Things happen very fast when you own so much. Bernard Arnault deserves this place.
Secret of Bernard Arnault’s Success
What is the secret of Bernard Arnault’s continuous Success? One important fact of Bernard Arnault’s success is his keen eye for detail and quality. He has strong power to spot value in failing brands and business sectors. Love of luxury with a combination of quality and innovation is a great strategy which helps Arnault to get this position.
Arnault has a realization power to invest in hidden value. His business dealings are most similar to Warren Buffett’s acquisition of strong brands. In fact, Arnault admired Warren Buffett as an inspiration publicly. Just like Warren Buffett, Bernard Arnault is a visionary to see value in things like- companies, products, trends that others simply miss.
To be patient and use the right time is another secret of Bernard Arnault’s success.
Bernard Arnault Awards & Achievement
Bernard Arnault has a great achievement and got different awards from government and private sectors.
Arnault was honoured as a Commander of the French Legion of Honour in 2007 and Grand Officer of the French Legion of Honour in 2011.
In 2011 he got the Woodrow Wilson Award from Global Corporate Citizenship.
In 2012 he was made a Honorary Knight Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire.
He was given the David Rockefeller Award from The Museum of Modern Art in 2014.
He has different achievements in the business sector. But the most significant achievement is he topped the position of world’s richest man.
Bernard Arnault Philanthropic Works
Bernard Arnault and his company LVMH is involved in several philanthropic activities.
He helps in medical research, humanitarian and scientific organizations. Save the Children, the Foundation for Hospitals in Paris, and the Princess Grace of Monaco Foundation are also his appreciable philanthropic works.
Lessons from Bernard Arnault’s Success Story
To be a great leader in the business sector is not an easy task. Bernard Arnault’s journey to become the leader of the world’s most famous brands is a great lesson for us.
The important lesson from Bernard Arnault’s Success is that beginnings never determine our destination. With our expertise and doing extraordinary things we can easily achieve success in our life.
Hope this success story of Bernard Arnault will help you to achieve massive success in your life. If this success story will inspire you, that will be a great thing.
Take care and see you next time in another success story.