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Luxury group PPR to call itself "Kering"

By FashionUnited

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Fashion

PPR, the French fashion luxury group that controls Stella McCartney, Gucci and Saint Laurent, said it is to change its name to "Kering". The name, pronounced like the English word “caring,” combines the word “ker”, meaning home in the

language spoken in the coastal region of Brittany where the Pinault family originates, and the suffix “ing,” which the company said indicates movement.

The
conglomerate is hoping its new change will see it channel its investment association away from the mass-market retail brands that grew its empire, and focus on its luxury and new casual and sportswear portfolio.

5th name change
According to the Globe and Mail this is the fifth name change since the company was listed on the French stock exchange in 1988, however the group's chief executive offer Francois-Henri Pinault was keen to stress “This is the first big change we have done on the name and identity of the group."

Hot on heels on the name change of YSL to Saint Laurent, PPR's new name was met with mixed reaction. “A name change makes sense because retail is not part of the group’s strategy any more. But frankly speaking … I would have seen a name closer to the luxury brands of the group or one that would have given the idea of luxury,” said Mario Ortelli, senior analyst at Bernstein Research.

Good luck in China
And in a nod to one of the world’s hottest luxury goods markets, PPR noted that its Chinese name would be Kering Kai Yun, with the latter two words referring to “an open sky which … demolishes barriers to imagination and dreams.”

“A synonym for good luck, ‘Kai Yun’ also embraces a very positive connotation in China,” the company said in its press kit about the name change.

Jacob Benbunan, chief executive of Saffron Brand Consultants, which lost out on the contract for PPR’s new brand strategy, said that while the new name probably “could be better,” the novelty would soon wear off.

“We human beings get used to things very fast,” he said. “We will also forget that Pinault-Printemps-Redoute was once called PPR and is now called Kering.”

Mr. Pinault said the owl in the logo, a sign of wisdom meant to represent the “visionary side” of the group, also pays homage to his father, Francois, who founded the company in 1963 as a timber trade firm and turned into an international group. The owl was his favourite animal.

PPR became a retail conglomerate in the 1990s through a series of takeovers that included Le Printemps department stores, mail order catalogue La Redoute, book retailer Fnac and furniture chain Conforama.

The acquisition of a 42 percent stake in Gucci Group in 1999 shifted the company, then known as Pinault-Printemps-Redoute, toward luxury and sports goods, prompting the gradual disposal of the retail businesses and a further name change to PPR SA in 2005, the year when Francois-Henri Pinault became CEO.

PPR plans to kick off a major advertising push in North America, Europe and Asia from the end of March, supplemented by a digital campaign on Facebook and Twitter as well a co-operation deal with French fashion blogger Garance Dore, a first for such a high-profile rebranding move.

Kering
name change
PPR