The recently announced exit of former Gucci CEO Marco Bizzarri, a luxury sector executive with a strong track record. surprised many. Bizzarri recently signed a three-year contract but will now be leaving in September.

This bobbing and weaving Kering parent decision-making comes at a time when Gucci once again seems to be not sure what it wants to be, when the brand grows up.

It’s equally possible that the recent entry of activist Bluebell Capital Partners into Kering’s orbit prompted Bizzarri’s departure. Bluebell arrives with significant goals of their own for Kering, and they are shareholders with clout.

In today’s world it’s totally understandable that brands must evolve and are often required to shake off the dust in a major way, to attract a new, younger client-base. Typically, though, luxury brands don’t run back to what they tried to escape eight years ago.

There’s an A-team on this new summer 2023 campaign including art directors Kevin Tekinel and Charles Levai, director Tin Seoi and photographer Leslie Zhang [IG], whose photography we love. Taiwanese actor Wen Qi and Chinese singer Daniel Zhou star are the lovebirds.

The campaign was clearly shot before Bluebell began stirring up trouble and demanding changes with Kering, regarding Gucci. So it was carrying a blessing from both Gucci and Kering.

Following the departure of Alessandro Michele, advertising campaigns and initiatives have lacked deep emotional storytelling — which has been Gucci’s strength under Bizzarri and Alessandro Michele.

AOC disagrees with more than one fashion writer who has seen this new Gucci ‘An Ode to Love’ campaign and responded with words of praise that storytelling is back at Gucci. Whew! AOC feels differently.

The recent second chapter of the Gucci Valigeria campaign, shot at The Savoy with Global Brand Ambassador Jungjae Lee, was like a plastic potted plant compared to chapter one.

It’s tough to compete with Ryan Gossling pushing his trolley loaded up with Valigeria luggage through foamy water at an ocean beach, while wearing a suit. This final scene comes after Gossling hit the open road with his fancy Gucci bags in the back of a pickup truck.

This new campaign is pure and innocent — which is not how Alessandro Michele served it up. He served up lighthearted frolic and fun, but always with an undercurrent of irony, social commentary, or a mental twist of a brain tease.

Alessandro Michele took you into the setting to experience the imagery yourself, not as an observer.

In my case, he sometimes dragged me, because I wasn’t in the mood to be part of the joke. Yet I chuckled when he grabbed me by the arm, saying “would you take a damn break, Anne, and let your imagination run wild.”

If one is being glossy superficial in our analysis and not looking under the hood, it’s easy to see the appeal of this new Gucci campaign. And I know that job #1 is to stop the revenue slide in China.

But this is a commercial; it’s a bunch of ads. And Gucci has not been making ads since Marco Bizzari and Alessandro Michele revved up the Gucci brand, which hadn’t recovered from Tom Ford’s departure.

They were two very different Gucci visions, but both were sophisticated and edgy in critically different ways. You might imagine that I was a Tom Ford Gucci woman.

After spending more months of my life in Asia than I can count — and commenting endlessly in recent days about the beautiful pre-fall fashion media coming out of Vogue China, W Magazine China and even Marie Claire China — I’m not certain where this campaign fits in.

I understand it’s a bridge, and at least the stars are dealing with the emotions of young love. But it borders on airport duty-free store imagery and product. Perhaps this is the goal — to keep the cash registers beeping. Gucci accounts for half of Kering's sales and almost two-thirds of its operating profit.

Coming off the Gucci ‘White Rabbit’ campaign for Chinese New Year which oozed deep human heart, this summer love campaign is a Hallmark card.

Then I think of the level of sophistication and emotion in the recent Louis Vuitton Men’s show, and all I can say is that hopefully my own gut-level instincts are off-kilter today.

My reaction to recent Gucci marketing begs the question — who is the emotional voice for Gucci now?

I know who the product voice or vision is — Sabato De Sarno. Is he charged with developing the brand voice — like Alessandro Michele — or does someone else have the assignment?

Presumably, the answer is Francesca Bellettini, who has run fast-growing fashion label Yves Saint Laurent since 2013. She has been named Kering's deputy CEO in charge of all brand development.

Alessandro Michele left me wondering more than once along the way, because he always magnified the moment. His campaigns had a deep resonance and layers that seemed to work well, including in China. And young people’s minds are used to theater and magnification in their digital world.

What I might regard is excess is normal to them.

Only today did I learn that China’s contribution to Gucci’s bottom line is statistically way more than to Louis Vuitton’s. Gucci must get China right, because they have an awful lot to lose if they don’t.

I only encourage the Gucci folks to really take a look at new fall media, because China — but also larger Asia — is producing more sophisticated, intellectual fashion content than Europe. You guys need to nail this Gucci brand direction now— and I hope these campaigns aren’t it.

Personally I felt that Alessandro Michele had perhaps pushed the envelope a bit too hard for China, who has been cracking down on cultural messaging. That’s a different twist to the challenge than making the marketing borderline duty-free shops.

If this is about budgets — which I can understand — given Kering’s current financial underperformance and Gucci being the top player — there are better ways to disguise that reality.

I’ve read positive commentary about this new campaign, and Gucci getting back on track — so I hate to be the contrarian. As I said, maybe I’m having a bad day, but we didn’t even post the Jungjae Lee at The Savoy commercial because it was so superficial visually and in all other aspects about artifice and not resonance.

I don’t take lightly being critical, and just went through Gucci’s Instagram back to last November, looking at customer reponses and engagement. I stand by my commentary. ~ Anne

Breaking News: Kering bought a 30% stake in Valentino for €1.7 billion, or $1.9 billion, with an option to buy the entirety of the Italian fashion house by 2028. The announcement came today, July 26, 2023.

Executives said the Valentino stake is the first step in a strategic partnership with Mayhoola, the Qatari investment fund that owns Valentino, that could lead to Mayhoola buying a stake in Kering. Mayhoola also owns the French fashion label Balmain.

Re Alessandro Michele: Of course Alessandro Michele is talking to Delphine Arnault about LVMH. And please don’t start baseless rumours. The Arnault family is a bunch of global ambassadors, especially when courting super-talented, visionary people. They consider issues of 1) who has the best LVMH stature to speak with AM; 2) who has the best personality fit? 3) Who among us understands HIM best . . . who would be his mentor in a new organization?

You get my drift. If Delphine Arnault understands him best among that tight inner circle, then she will do the talking for now.LVMH understands visionaires and they are willing to cultivate them — even rearange the brand deck to develop talent. Only a few people at LVMH can rearrange a brand deck and also get the necessary agreement among all the players, while also having the capacity to understand and respect AM’s genius.

My focus was also another brand from the golden era not owned by LVMH but now by Mayhoola. And then — as Lauren Sherman wrote in Puck — there’s always Chanel. Hmmm. And now Marco Bizzarri finds himself a free agent when he had recently signed a new contract with Kering. I hadn’t thought about this fact. The sands are shifting.