As if the luxury goods industry were not already in a fragile mood, Johann Rupert, chairman of Richemont, owner of Cartier and Van Cleef & Arpels, gave it more to worry about this week. He warned of the damage it faces from growing wealth inequality, and resentment among the have-nots of those who flaunt luxury watches and jewellery.
“What keeps me awake at night is how society will cope with structural unemployment and envy, hatred and class warfare,” he told the FT Business of Luxury Summit in Monaco, discussing his fear that artificial intelligence will kill jobs. “The people with money will not wish to show it. If your child’s best friend’s parents are unemployed, you won’t want to buy anything showy.”
From where I sat, listening to him, a revolution did not appear to be in progress. Ferraris were driving up to the hotel and multi-decked yachts, some with helicopter pads, filled the harbour. “You are as paranoid as I am,” Ralph Lauren once told Mr Rupert, who concluded: “If you have a healthy dose of paranoia, you survive.”