The latest results from Louis Vuitton owner LVMH show that luxury shoppers are sobering up after years of heavy spending
3 min
The end of easy money is catching up with luxury brands. It took a long time, so the skills needed to protect their profit margins may be a bit rusty.
Shares in the world’s biggest luxury company, LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, fell 6% Wednesday after it reported a slowdown in sales for the third quarter the previous evening. LVMH grew sales by 9% for the three months through September compared with a year ago. That sounds impressive, but the business was growing at almost double this pace in the second quarter.
Demand for luxury goods has slowed for most products and in all major regions. One surprise was a 14% drop in sales at LVMH’s wines and spirits divisions. Shipments of cognac brands such as Hennessy have been weak in the U.S. all year as cash from pandemic stimulus checks runs out, but the trend is getting worse.
The slowdown is no longer limited to “aspirational” shoppers, as the industry lingo frames less wealthy buyers. Sales of LVMH’s expensive watch and jewellery brands were weaker than analysts expected. And wealthy European consumers who were spending freely on luxury goods early this summer turned cautious in the third quarter.
Investors knew that a slowdown was coming, but not how big it would be. After Wednesday’s share-price drop, LVMH has lost a quarter of its market value in roughly six months. The slump may be more severe at weaker rivals like Burberry or Gucci owner Kering, whose stocks also fell Wednesday. Recently, the entire luxury industry has fallen out of fashion with shareholders, who at the start of the year expected a bigger surge in Chinese demand after the country lifted all pandemic restrictions.
With business probably as good as it can get in China, there is no obvious place the industry can turn to for new growth. Weaker demand for luxury goods will damp brands’ ability to raise prices. Last year, exceptionally strong sales helped them lift prices by 8% on average, according to UBS estimates. This pricing power has been a big draw for investors, and boosted profit margins, but it is probably over for now. In the four years leading up to the pandemic, prices rose only 1.2% annually on average.
Luxury companies face a balancing act with their multibillion-dollar advertising budgets and store-rollout plans. They may need to save cash to protect margins. At the same time, they must continue to spend on advertising to maintain their trademark desirability.
Some perspective is necessary, though: Today, LVMH’s fashion-and-leather-goods division, its main profit driver, is 80% larger than it was in the third quarter of 2019, before the pandemic. The industry has had an amazing run and is expected to grow in 2024. Still, some of the sheen that made it particularly attractive to investors in recent years has faded.
Last month, LVMH was even dethroned as Europe’s most valuable company by Novo Nordisk, the Danish pharmaceutical company behind weight-loss drug Ozempic. Leaner times ahead.
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Apple’s first foldable, the $1,999 iPhone Duo, combines an iPhone and iPad Mini experience—but its size, weight and price come with compromises.
4 min
As I watched a Netflix show on Apple’s first foldable, the iPhone Duo, I had two surprising thoughts.
The first: Maybe I don’t need my iPad Mini anymore.
The second: Uh oh, am I about to spend $1,999 on a phone?
I didn’t think folding phones were for me. I’ve been testing Android versions from Samsung and Google since 2019, and those early editions came with too much screen and too many compromises.
Fast forward seven years, and the technology has come a long way. Apple—in its very Apple way—has also come up with some hardware and software trickery to make up for some shortcomings of the basic design. My desire for a folding phone before today was zero. After today, it’s a lot more than zero.
I’m not ready to recommend the Duo, which ships on Oct. 23, just yet. Not until I am able to test it more fully, so be on the lookout for that review in a few weeks. But from what I experienced at Apple Park on Wednesday, I could actually picture myself using this new half-phone, half-tablet hybrid.
For months, I’ve been using Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold 8, a similarly squat, passport-shaped foldable that opens up to a larger screen. It’s impressively thin and can easily fit into the infuriatingly tiny pockets in women’s pants and dresses. Samsung did a lot of work to minimize the crease—the dip between the two halves of the big interior display—but it’s still clearly there.
When I held the iPhone Duo open, the crease was barely visible. As I slid my finger across the display, I could feel it, but it’s more subtle than Samsung’s. Most of the time, the screen looked as flat and smooth as the one on an iPad.
Apple employed both software and hardware techniques to camouflage the crease. The matte surface of the interior 7.6-inch screen minimizes reflections to hide it. (Samsung’s Fold 8 screen is shiny.)
And as you begin to open or close the iPhone Duo, the interface shifts the controls and content away from the center crease. If, say, you’re watching a video on the outer screen, you can open the Duo to switch to the bigger display within. A black fade marks the transition. You don’t see the video full screen until the phone is completely flat.
My second observation was that, when the Duo is closed, in phone mode, it was harder to use one-handed than I expected.
In the keynote trailer and press release, Apple touted how thin the Duo is. It’s marketed as the thinnest iPhone ever—when open.
But it’s actually thicker and heavier than most of its Android competitors. The Duo weighs 254 grams, and is 11.3 millimeters thick when closed. The Samsung Galaxy Fold 8 is just 201 grams, with a thickness of 9.7 millimeters. Google’s Pixel 11 Pro Fold is 239 grams and 10.1 millimeters.
Because the Duo is also wider than a standard iPhone, I found it quite a challenge to type.
I admit, I do have smaller-than-average hands. So I consulted my colleague Rolfe Winkler, who has a larger grip. He agreed the Duo feels big.
Apple rearranged the interface on the outer screen so it looks different than traditional iPhones. The dock and control center are off to the right to be more reachable. Committing to the Duo as your main device will require adjustments in your handling. You will have to learn a new way to use and type.
My most surprising takeaway? I feel a pull toward this device.
I always thought that combining an iPhone and an iPad would mean bigger compromises. The battery life is about the same as the 18 Pro (up to 24 hours of “regular use” on a single charge), though I’ll need to verify that in my real-world testing. And it’s also as durable, with the same IP68 dust- and water-resistance rating as the rest of the iPhone lineup.
There are trade-offs, for sure. Trying out the camera, I immediately missed the 8X zoom in my Pro model. The Duo has just 2X zoom, which wouldn’t cut it for the dozens of pictures I take of my kid every day.
But the dual screens unlock new photo functionality. You can see what your shot looks like from the outside screen. As someone who has tried tirelessly to self-direct a family photo—or a spouse—I am very eager to try this out more.
Foldables, I initially thought, were for classic mobile-warrior jet-setter types, who never sit at a desk and are always on calls. For that crowd, the Duo can run two apps side-by-side.
Me, I’m more of a bed binge-watcher and ebook reader. That’s what my beloved iPad Mini is for.
Watching videos on the Duo is a nice experience—nice enough that you forget the screen is 0.7 inches smaller than the iPad Mini’s. The main screen is also a 4:3 aspect ratio. Very similar, by the way, to the IMAX edition of the Odyssey.
Because I wasn’t able to snag a ticket to one of the sold-out screenings, I will be watching Christopher Nolan’s version of Homer’s epic on the Duo, just as the director intended. (Just kidding! Sort of.)
The Duo costs $800 more than an iPhone 18 Pro, and I’m not sure I want to spend that premium on a first-generation Apple device. But I’m not ruling out the idea that a Duo might one day be in my future. Stay tuned for my full review.
