Fashion
GrandVision, owner of eyewear chains Pearle and Eye Wish, has been hit hard by the corona crisis in the past year. The group even had to close the financial year with a loss.
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General
Ray-Ban manufacturer EssilorLuxottica proposed to the European Commission to sell off branches in three member states of the EU. The eyewear giant thus hopes to gain permission to take over GrandVision.
Between Christmas and New Year we traditionally look back: which articles on RetailDetail.eu were read the most last year? This overview gives a nice picture of the events in the insane retail year 2020. And no, not every article was about corona...
(Update) French-Italian manufacturer and designer of glasses EssilorLuxottica seems to no longer be interested in buying GrandVision, the mother company of Eyewish and Pearl. But the company firmly denies these rumours.
The planned merger between GrandVision and EssilorLuxottica is all but dead, as the former now agrees that the deal should be stopped... provided the French-Italian company pays a 400 million euro fee, sparking just another battle in the eyewear war.
The conflict between eyewear groups EssilorLuxottica and GrandVision is escalating: both are taking ever more drastic steps against their adversary in order to bend their "marriage" to their advantage.
Over the past six months, EssilorLuxottica (Ray-Ban, Varilux) has seen its profits evaporate almost completely. In the meantime, the planned merger with GrandVision has led to a war between the two parties.
The European Union imposes conditions on EssilorLuxottica's acquisition of Grandvision (the parent company of Pearle and Eye Wish): the merged company will have to divest stores in Italy and in the Netherlands and/or France.
The European Commission has formulated concerns regarding the acquisition of eyewear retailer GrandVision by EssilorLuxottica, fearing the resulting group could become too powerful as the French-Italian group is already an important producer of eyewear.
Italian-French eyewear producer and retailer EssilorLuxottica and ready-to-wear holding company VF Corporation both have announced management changes. EssilorLuxottica CEO Laurent Vacherot retires, while the owner of Kipling and Eastpak welcomes new managers for both brands.
Dutch eyewear retailer GrandVision suffered a profit drop last year, despite a 9 % turnover rise. Moreover, the acquisition by EssilorLuxottica is still on hold as European competition authorities want to further look into the deal.
Competing eyewear retailers are concerned about the acquisition of GrandVision by industry giant EssilorLuxottica. They have voiced their grievances to the European Commission, which has yet to approve the takeover.
A fraud that has come to light in an EssilorLuxottica factory in Thailand, could cost the French-Italian eyewear group nearly 200 million euros.
French-Italian optics group EssilorLuxottica has bought its Dutch competitor GrandVision in a deal that values the latter on 7.1 billion euros. The merger of the companies owning the Ray-Ban glasses and Pearle stores respectively is still subject to approval of the competition watchdogs.
