Reuters A fresh marketing push could help the brand Tiffany.

Reuters In a video message to employees during the town hall, LVMH boss Bernard Arnault, who is also France’s richest man, said he wanted to elevate Tiffany’s standing, even if that took time.

Tiffany’s Blue Now Belongs To LVMH; Ambani, PeeCee, Gaga’s Connections To The Iconic Brand

Autoplay Autoplay 1 of 6 ​The Big Buyout French luxury giant LVMH, on Monday, acquired iconic American jeweller Tiffany for $16.2 billion. The acquisition, which took just over a month and three revised bids to get done, is the biggest-ever deal for the French group owned by Bernard Arnault.

According to a report in news agency Reuters, Tiffany was codenamed “Tea” and LVMH was “Latte” during the talks that led to the takeover.

Reuters also reported that LVMH’s 70-year-old billionaire boss was himself ‘focused on ensuring he was getting control of Tiffany’s most valuable assets: all the patented elements that came with the Tiffany brand, notably its robin’s egg blue boxes’.

The third-richest man in the world, Arnault, emphasised on the importance of the blue in an interview with the news agency, saying, “We’re the owner of a colour. It’s a pretty rare thing.”

LVMH had forayed into high-end jewellery in 2011, when it acquired Italian jeweller Bulgari. The India Connect Earlier this year, the iconic jeweller was making national headlines due to reports of it coming to India in partnership with India’s richest man, Mukesh Ambani.

According to news reports, Ambani-led Reliance Brands has plans to bring the iconic blue box to Delhi and Mumbai by mid-2020.

‘Quantico’ star Priyanka Chopra also has a personal connect with the brand. Not only did the star host her bridal shower at the the Blue Box cafe, situated inside the brand’s flagship store, but her singer-hubby Nick Jonas also shut down the Fifth Avenue outpost to pick the perfect 4-carat ring for her. ​The Original Blue Tiffany’s storied history dates back to 1837, when the first store opened on Broadway in New York. Founded by Charles Lewis Tiffany, the iconic brand initially sold stationary, handkerchiefs and other finery.

On opening, it became the first company to clearly mark prices on its products, leaving no option of bargaining. It also started a new norm by only accepting payments in cash.

Over the next decade, the company shifted to jewellery. In 1848, it started acquiring exotic European collections and crown jewels, including diamonds worn by Marie-Antoinette.

Almost unstoppable, two years later, Tiffany had opened a store at rue de Richelieu in Paris. This expansion continued, with a London store in 1868, and eventually a watch factory in Geneva, a few years later.

The legendary brand saw a new direction with Charles’s painter-son, Louis Comfort Tiffany, becoming the company’s first official design officer. At the end of the 19th century, stained glassworks and lamps by Tiffany Jr. became synonymous with the ‘Gilded Age’ in America, with some of them even being installed at the White House. They were later removed early in the 20th century.

(Image: AP) ​The Making Of An Icon The rise of Tiffany parallels that of New York. The American jeweller set up its flagship store on Fifth Avenue in 1940, creating a landmark that attracts tourists even today. This store now accounts for almost 10 per cent of the brand’s overall sales.

Over time, the aspirational value of the brand increased with the emergence of America’s high society as its customers. From the Kennedys and Richard Nixon to Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, the brand became synonymous with classy indulgence.

In 1862, President Abraham Lincoln purchased a Tiffany seed pearl necklace and earrings for his wife for the inaugural ball.

(Image: AFP)

​A Star Is Born The brand’s flagship store also houses the famous Tiffany yellow diamond, that Charles bought in 1878 for $18,000. The 287.42-carat diamond, said to be one of the world’s finest gemstones, was cut into a cushion-shape of 128.54 carats, and named the ‘Tiffany Diamond’.

Over 300 guests throng the store each day for a glimpse of the diamond.

The rare stone has only ever been worn three times in history. The most-recent being Lady Gaga, who arrived at the Oscars this year with the diamond around her neck. The gem was worn for the first time at the 1957 Tiffany Ball in Newport, Rhode Island by Mary Whitehouse. Following her, Audrey Hepburn became the second person to be granted permission to wear the diamond, for promotion of ‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s’. The actress wore the stone in a Jean Schlumberger necklace.

(Image: Reuters)

PARIS/MILAN: French luxury goods group LVMH plans to overhaul Tiffany & Co’s vast merchandise lineup to increase the focus on gold and precious gems and take its silver bangles upmarket after closing the $15.8 billion takeover of the U.S. jeweller this month.Six sources, including two people with inside knowledge of Tiffany’s operations, told Reuters the owner of Louis Vuitton would also likely revamp the appearance of the jeweller’s stores and boost its presence in Europe and Asia.More than a third of Tiffany’s 320 shops are in the United States and two sources described some of them as out-of-date, shoddy and in need of refurbishing.“LVMH can give Tiffany the kind of time and money needed to make some big investments in the product range and in stores worldwide, and wait for those to pay off in the medium term,” one of the sources said.At a town hall in New York for Tiffany’s 14,000 employees on Jan. 8 - a day after LVMH installed a new leadership team - the group’s new bosses laid out their initial plans to focus on high-end, sparkling jewellery , said one person who attended it. The group is also considering building out Tiffany’s lineup in watches, another source familiar with its thinking said.Compared with rivals, such as Richemont-owned Cartier and Van Cleef & Arpels, as well as fellow LVMH brand Bulgari, Tiffany’s products are a broad range from $150 silver pendants to diamond necklaces priced in the tens of millions.Silver jewellery has gross margins of around 90% and offers an entry point for younger, less wealthy shoppers, but top industry names also need the medium- to high range - with a price tag above $100,000 - to create an aura of exclusivity, experts say.In a video message to employees during the town hall, LVMH boss Bernard Arnault , who is also France’s richest man, said he wanted to elevate Tiffany’s standing, even if that took time.“We will also prioritize Tiffany’s long-term desirability over short-term constraints,” Arnault said, according to a person who attended. At one point brandishing one of Tiffany’s signature robin’s egg-blue boxes, Arnault underscored the label could count on cash-rich LVMH’s resources.The world’s biggest luxury goods group, also home to Moet & Chandon champagne, was shaken by the COVID-19 pandemic and sales in airport stores plunged, but its biggest labels have been robust.The mood among some of Tiffany’s workforce is anxious nonetheless.A senior store employee in Europe said the jeweller would benefit as a more sophisticated, exclusive brand under LVMH, but also worried about the group’s reputation as a demanding owner.“If a store doesn’t quite work, they just shut it down,” this person said, speaking on condition of anonymity.Arnault is known for dropping in on stores unexpectedly - including at a Tiffany store in Seoul after the deal was announced in late 2019, where he pointed out blips such as a cleaning product that had been left out on a stand and a pink Post-It note saying “not available” that had been put up on a product, people familiar with the group said.LVMH and Tiffany declined to comment. LVMH is due to report full-year 2020 results later on Tuesday.After a bruising court battle midway through the acquisition process, which ended with Tiffany and LVMH renegotiating the price tag slightly downwards, Arnault had soothing words for the U.S. jeweller.He told the town hall Tiffany’s resilience in recent months had exceeded LVMH’s expectations, one of those present said.The group had previously called Tiffany’s prospects “dismal” due to poor management during the COVID-19 crisis.Tiffany regained some ground through online sales and in China in its last quarter. Jewellery as a whole, one of the fastest growing luxury sectors in recent years, has been more resilient than other areas during the pandemic.Tiffany is less exposed than rivals to Asia-Pacific - a major driver for luxury sales - which accounted for 28% of its worldwide sales of $4.4 billion in 2019. Europe stood at 11%.Jean-Christophe Babin, who runs Bulgari, the brand bought by LVMH in 2011, told Reuters negotiations with mall owners on stores or with airports on advertising billboards were far more advantageous when carried out by a group comprising dozens of brands.“We can share a screen at arrivals with (watch brand Tag Heuer),” Babin said in an interview. “These are synergies that we had and that Tiffany will have that will help improve profitability.“Babin said that Bulgari financed its own investments in stores and production, but that internal competition with other LVMH stablemates had cranked up the jeweller’s ambitions and performance.“The brand was a sleeping beauty, the arrival of LVMH was a wake-up call,” Babin said.New York-based Tiffany, founded in 1837, achieved world fame with the 1961 movie “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” starring Audrey Hepburn, but a fresh marketing push could help the brand.Alexandre Arnault - one of four Arnault children with roles at LVMH and now Tiffany’s executive vice president, in charge of product and communication - told the town hall he would focus on advertising campaigns and luring young customers.The 28-year-old helped LVMH acquire luggage maker Rimowa and gave it a hipster edge while CEO there, through collaborations with Dior that made it sexy for the runway.The young Arnault will work alongside new CEO Anthony Ledru, who ran Vuitton’s global commercial activities but is also known for rolling out its high-end jewellery line and had a previous stint at Tiffany and also at Cartier.He takes over from Alessandro Bogliolo, who had already overseen a multi-year renovation of Tiffany’s flagship New York store on Fifth Avenue, and the purchase of an 80-carat-plus oval diamond to be set in a necklace that will become its most expensive piece of jewellery.