OTB may be smaller than some of the other luxury groups, but its brands have a growing impact on the fashion landscape — from Maison Margiela, which is arguably at the height of its powers following John Galliano’s Artisanal show, to Marni, which met critical acclaim following its Spring/Summer 2024 show in September. OTB scion Stefano Rosso is chairman of Maison Margiela, CEO of Marni and CEO of BVX (Brave Virtual Xperience), OTB’s business unit dedicated to products for virtual worlds.
While cognisant of the luxury slowdown, Rosso is finding opportunities for OTB to boost market share, via global expansion and innovation. “It’s a moment of rationalisation [in luxury]” Rosso said, during a conversation as part of the Vogue Business Executive Summit. “If people are going to spend their money, they want to see and understand the value. After Covid, there was a huge run of price increases. For a certain time, it worked; I’ve seen bags jumping from €1,000 to €5,000. But it’s not that time anymore. The customers are tired of spending without a reason. They want to invest but perceive value… You can’t trick them into buying anymore because of a label.” At OTB, this value is linked to quality and supply chain transparency, a “huge point of attention” for the group.
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OTB is often described by founder Renzo Rosso as an “alternative” luxury group, and this rings true in Stefano Rosso’s retail expansion strategy for Marni and Maison Margiela. While most luxury players falter in China, OTB is still investing in the market, seeing growth potential in its much smaller market exposure. “Even with the crisis of China the last few months, we’re still a relatively small group versus competitors, so China remains an area of interest and focus,” Rosso said. “When I look at the competition, our stores are a fifth of the size — there’s still so much space for growth for us. The crisis is an opportunity for us to gain some square feet in stores.” He’s also “very attracted” to the Middle East, which he sees as luxury’s next frontier. Plus the US. “For the potential of our brands, in the US, we’re not performing at the level we should be.”
On supply chain transparency, OTB has invested “heavily” in technology to improve traceability on its products, ahead of incoming legislation. Notably, the Aura Blockchain consortium, of which OTB (alongside much bigger players like LVMH and Prada Group) is a founding member, led by Rosso. “It’s the first time we’ve sat at the same table, sharing innovation and making steps to change the industry,” he said. “Our industry has always been spoiled due to the high margins that we have. Everybody felt ‘my field is better than yours’ and protected their space. The fact that for the first time we are really coming together and thinking about the best opportunity we can give to our brands and our customers, it’s a huge step forwards for the industry.” In OTB’s innovation roadmap, it has a lot of processes that rely on blockchain. For example, Aura allows OTB to accelerate its work on digital product passports, ahead of legislation in 2027 that will render them compulsory.
Rosso isn’t afraid of the technology hype cycle we’ve seen in recent years. Instead, OTB is happy to ride the waves and test and learn, from the metaverse to blockchain. “Sometimes it doesn’t work, but it’s the path to get there that’s the most important… And you have the competitive advantage of being first if it does peak,” Rosso said. One example, Diesel’s first NFT project, where the fanbase could buy an NFT, and once purchased, co-create a physical shoe with Diesel’s design team. It was successful and proved an appetite for investment in non-physical products, as well as the willingness to wait for the physical product to arrive (the co-designed shoes took six months to create). In the artificial intelligence space, OTB is experimenting, for now on trend forecasting, buying operations and talent management, Rosso said, with more news to come in the future on AI collaborations. “I truly believe AI is still a tool squeezed between humans. It is not replacing human initiative. It is a tool to accelerate.”
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