French department store group Galeries Lafayette has placed Nicolas Morineaux, a luxury and finance expert with a strong track record in Asia, at the helm of its China business.
As managing director of the company’s four branches in China—two of which launched in Shenzhen and Chongqing earlier this year—Morineaux was hired in December 2023.
Morineaux, a 2001 alumnus of ESSEC Business School, spent 21 years as an employee of luxury conglomerate LVMH. Before ascending to the post of vice-president finance for the company’s Asia-Pacific fashion division, he was first in charge of Celine’s sales in Japan. After that, Morineaux spent nearly a year working as the sales director for Asia at the Richemont group-owned jeweller Van Cleef & Arpels.
He takes Lawrence Shum’s place at Galeries Lafayette, where his goal is to quicken the company’s entry into the Chinese market by using an omni-channel and multi-universe strategy.
Galeries Lafayette entered China for the first time in 2013, but to advance the French group’s presence in the nation, it signed a joint venture agreement with Hopson Group, a Chinese real estate company, in April. By 2025, the objective is to have ten locations around China, one of which will be in Macau.
Currently, Galeries Lafayette runs 10 more locations abroad in addition to 57 locations in France (19 of which are directly owned and 38 of which are franchised). It has made the decision to close its sole location in Berlin, Germany, and is preparing to expand into India in 2024 by establishing department stores in Mumbai and New Delhi, once more with the help of an Indian business Aditya Birla.
