LVMH History
Earlier company descriptions, brand line-ups, store counts and photographs from the history of LVMH, kept for historical reference.
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The Company Description of Its Time
LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton SE, better known as LVMH, is a French multinational luxury goods conglomerate, native of France and headquartered in Paris. The company was formed in 1987 under the merger of the fashion house Louis Vuitton with Moet Hennessy, a company formed after the 1971 merger between the champagne producer Moet & Chandon and Hennessy, the cognac manufacturer. Two mergers, sixteen years apart, are compressed into that sentence: first wine and spirits combined, then the combined house joined a fashion and leather goods house to create the modern luxury group.
The Houses, by Sector, as Recorded
The historical record lists examples of the Group's popular brands in clothing, footwear, fashion accessories and beauty, sector by sector. In Fashion and Leather Goods: Berluti, Celine, Dior, EDUN, Emilio Pucci, Fendi, Givenchy, Kenzo, Loewe, Loro Piana, Louis Vuitton, Marc Jacobs, Moynat, Nicholas Kirkwood, Rimowa and Thomas Pink. In Watches and Jewelry: Bulgari, Chaumet, FRED, Hublot, TAG Heuer and Zenith. In Perfumes and Cosmetics: Acqua di Parma, Benefit Cosmetics, Fresh, Givenchy Parfums, Guerlain, Kenzo Parfums, Make Up For Ever, Parfums Christian Dior, Perfumes Loewe and Maison Francis Kurkdjian. The page's image map linked a selection of those fashion houses directly, and those house links are carried in the References below.
Two governance and portfolio facts complete the recorded picture. Christian Dior, the luxury goods group, is the main holding company of LVMH (2017) - the date is the historical record's, and it is kept with the fact. And in 2016 LVMH sold Donna Karan International, with the Donna Karan and DKNY brands, to the G-III Apparel Group for $650 million; G-III, based in New York City, is a manufacturer and distributor of clothing and accessories under owned, licensed and private label brands. That sale is why this page's links include the G-III profile in this directory: the buyer of two LVMH brands is itself a company profiled here.
Independence Inside a Group
The structural idea a researcher should take from this record is the combination of central ownership with operating independence. Around 60 subsidiaries each manage a small number of brands, and they are often managed independently - so a House keeps its own creative direction, heritage and specialty legacy, while the Group supplies the scale behind it. As the world leader in luxury, LVMH has been setting an example through its dynamic growth since its creation in 1987, as the historical record closes. The six-sector spread matters to that growth story: fashion and leather goods, watches and jewelry, and perfumes and cosmetics sit alongside the wine and spirits houses where the group's oldest names began.
Use this page for the recorded history - the 1987 formation, the Paris headquarters, the 70 Houses and six sectors, the sector lists above, the 2017 holding-company note and the 2016 Donna Karan sale - each kept with its period attached. This rebuild asserts no later acquisitions, sales or totals beyond the historical record. The official LVMH website is carried in the References, together with the fashion-house links from the historical record's image map, and the kept route to the luxury fashion term page remains on this page for readers who want the concept defined before the conglomerate that leads it.
Photos
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References & Further Reading
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