Zoughaib & Sons - jewelry with a theme.

OK, so this is interesting, a while back Doumit Zoughaib split from the mother company Zoughaib & Sons (to become Zoughaib and co). Now, for a long time - yearly - Zoughaib (back then indistinguishable as a brand from one another because Doumit was still there) would come up with a theme. This year, Zoughaib & Sons is continuing the tradition (sans Doumit) while launching "eventail" (or "fan"). Interestingly, Doumit has created a more seasonally compatible "snowflake" collection (see here). Well, a jeweler I know told me that for a long time the Lebanese market was so incredibly stagnant he had to branch out to Dubai just to keep his atelier in Lebanon busy - to avoid laying off all his craftspeople because the local showroom was empty. So for Zoughaib & Sons to launch new collections and advertise them is indeed a bold move.

Tiffany & Co - not your mother's brand.

It all started with "Not your father's Oldsmobile".

"Not your mother's Tiffany" - Tiffany & Co just unveiled their first post-LVMH acquisition campaign. Mark Riston loves it, Quirino Malandrino is appalled (both are communication giants). Well, to begin with, I am not the correct target audience for the campaign, so I am a bit torn as to the relevance of what I am saying (to quote the sitcom friends "No uterus, no opinion"). 

The campaign goes after young women (the ones featured in the ads are all 20 something self-confident females), telling them that Tiffany has indeed evolved and changed since their mother's days. With a new generation ditching "classic" wedding bands in the US, with many no longer interested in family heirloom jewelry, it seems fitting that LVMH wants to dust a brand which is no longer "cool". Mind you if you look at other brands within the LVMH stable - there is a very discernable pattern: Louis Vuitton has gone full Virgil Abloh and is now having a Nike Air Force 1 sneaker and an NBA product tie up, Celine has ditched the Phoebe Philo philosophy to go after the cool-trust-fund kids with Hedi Slimane, Kenzo has little if anything to do it with its own founder's principles. 

Truth be told however, Antoine Arnault, the son of Bernard Arnault who is the CEO of LVMH, did a superb job revitalizing luggage brand Rimowa, and is now the man handling Tiffany. Mind you there are ways and others of revitalizing a brand. When Hermes hired Martin Margiela as a creative director Jean-Louis Dumas the then chairman of Hermes asked the designer if he was going to cut the (famous handbag model) Kelly in two. What Margiela did however is produce what is now highly-saught after collections for the brand. He also introduced a 6-hole button which when sewn would produce the letter "H" in threads. 

But I digress.

Perhaps the whole point of the Tiffany campaign is simply to make ink spill about it - which works well (consider this article as an example!). LVMH has rescued many brands from dustiness - who knows? They might pull a miracle with the stale Emilio Pucci. If non-LVMH owned Courreges is any measure, 60s esthetic is currently all the rage. 

Small note, Oldsmobile is dead. So I am wishing Tiffany all the best.

Le Comte - investing in gold.

So now that we agreed that real estate is a double whammy should you invest in it (better look here), why not try gold? Well, at least gold is indeed a safe investment and Le Comte jewelry plays on the classical "your currency has depreciated", but at least to some logical end - which, obviously is investing in gold (which apparently you can buy in Lebanese Pound).

Again, Lebanese people are trying to smuggle their money out of banks in any way possible, and well, there not too many ways to do it that being said. And with outcomes becoming bleaker by the second, here's the silver lining - I mean the gold lining!