Dior’s Sidney Toledano to step down after 20 years as Fendi boss Pietro Beccari steps in
Veteran Sidney Toledano will step down as Dior CEO and take an expanded role as head of LVMH Fashion
“He will be an excellent leader who will steer Dior towards ever greater success,” LVMH’s chairman and chief executive, billionaire Bernard Arnault, said.
Toledano, who was born in Casablanca and is 66, is credited with boosting sales at Dior and steering the couture house through various cycles of designers.
He will now head a broader fashion group within LVMH and be named to LVMH’s executive committee, the company said, as will Beccari.
The generational shift at Dior comes months after LVMH, the world’s biggest luxury goods company, brought the couture part of the label in-house for US$7.5 billion, uniting it with the perfume and beauty offshoots.
The deal boosted LVMH earnings at a time when luxury goods sales are riding high on revived demand from Chinese consumers.
Arnault said Toledano, who will now have brands such as Givenchy, Celine and Marc Jacobs under his mantle, had been “the driving force behind the huge success of Christian Dior Couture across the world.”
Dior’s sales have doubled over the past five years. Under Toledano, who ran Dior’s leather goods unit before taking the top role in 1998, the label released its hit Lady Dior handbag, still a staple for the 70-year-old brand.
