LVMH, the parent company of Moët Hennessy, has lined up a change of leader at its beverage alcohol unit.
Philippe Schaus (below), who has been with the France-headquartered group for 21 years, the last seven of which have been with Moët Hennessy, will stand aside at the start of February. Replacing him will be Jean-Jacques Guiony, a current member of LVMH’s executive committee.
In a statement earlier today, LVMH said Schaus has “decided to begin a new chapter in his career, focusing on non-executive roles”. He will stay with the Hennessy cognac brand owner for the rest of this year and the first half of 2025 in order to “share his expertise in the sector”.
Guiony will be joined by Alexandre Arnault, who will take on the newly-created position of deputy CEO. Arnault is one of LVMH head Bernard Arnault’s sons and is the executive VP for product, communications & industrial at the group’s Tiffany & Co business.
At the same time, the CEO of Hennessy, Laurent Boillot, will make way for Charles Delapalme, who has been MD of Christian Dior Couture at LVMH since the start of last year. Boillot looks set to stay with the group as his “new responsibilities will be announced at a later date”.
The reshuffle comes almost exactly a month after LVMH was moved to deny speculation that Schaus would be moved on. A report by French news outlet La Lettre in October said the company would replace Schaus with Boillot, leading LVMH to express “surprise” at what it called “inaccurate rumours”.
Since reporting a 4% decline in full-year sales for 2023 in January, Moët Hennessy, which is 34%-owned by Diageo, has had a challenging time this year: The 7% fall in sales from the three months to the end of September, announced last month, was preceded by performances of -12% in the first quarter and -5% in Q2.
