Challenges of Luxury: Between Brand DNA and the Need for Transformation

Anne-Marie Deblonde is Director of the Distribution Practice at Grant Alexander and an expert in the digitalization of organizations. Passionate about observing shifts that generate new challenges and professions, she analyzes trend evolutions in the Retail and Media sectors, as well as within Brands.
She shares with us her exchanges on these subjects with peers, clients, and candidates, and brings us the perspective of Valérie Duret, a retail expert in the luxury sector. Valérie’s career has spanned Emanuel Ungaro, Diane von Furstenberg, and Burberry, where she was Retail Director for Northern Europe.
Here are the key insights…
The retail world has been impacted by digital transformation for more than a decade, yet luxury remains a unique field. Between strong or emerging brand images, brands with significant financial means and those with fewer resources, those that embraced digital in time and those that still struggle to take the leap—how are luxury brands managing to transform both the user experience and the sales experience?
Discover Valérie Duret’s perspective, in which she highlights both barriers and solutions, emphasizing the importance of striking the right balance between human touch and digital innovation.
Through field shopping observations worldwide and among DNVBs (Digitally Native Vertical Brands), Valérie identifies what she calls “advanced experiences” and shares her convictions about the re-enchantment of the luxury consumer’s purchasing journey. She stresses the real risk of sustainability for brands that fail to transform.
Her reflections, illustrated with concrete examples, address several aspects of the value chain:
the evolving role of designers,
the place of the physical retail space within the omnichannel ecosystem,
the integration of digital in-store solutions.
She also questions the consequences of fashion conceived by AI and data scientists, as well as the new mission of sales associates and their managers—fostering greater inclusivity with clients while also engaging in upstream profiling.
Valérie explains why and how she conducts this work of analysis and transformation, all while navigating the inevitable resistances to change.
Read the full interview