“We are in the green”: the new boss of Printemps ensures that the department store “is not a model in crisis”, despite competition from fast-fashion and second-hand goods

New general manager of the Printemps group, which is in the midst of a reorganization, Rémy Baume assures that the department store "is not a model in crisis", although "complicated". Arriving in June, he aims to make Printemps the reference "on welcome and hospitality", he said in an interview. Former CEO of Zadig&Voltaire, this fifty-year-old worked at LVMH/Groupe Arnault and Carrefour before joining Le Printemps in a delicate context: in April, the French brand founded in 1865 announced that it wanted to cut its workforce and close its Rennes store to refocus on its "fundamentals", particularly in the face of competition from ultra-ephemeral and second-hand fashion.

The agreement signed since with two unions (Unsa, CFE-CGC) provides for 222 job cuts out of 3,000, 93 creations and 17 contract modifications. The Rennes store, located in a shopping center "incompatible" according to management with a high-end "positioning", will lower the curtain in February.

“We want to get closer to the sales teams and have fewer managerial layers,” explains Rémy Baume, who succeeds Jean-Marc Bellaiche, who left last year from the group bought in 2013 by Qatari shareholders of the Disa fund. The group is focusing on welcoming customers. Its strategy for 2030 is based on three axes: a more fluid and "open-walled" organization, acceleration on artificial intelligence, and above all a strengthening of the conditions for welcoming and welcoming customers. “We sell expensive products, so the experience has to be really up to par,” insists Mr.

Baume, recalling that the brand already offers “many services” (spas, catering, personal shopping, alterations, etc.). The department store is a model that can prosper if it is managed with "finesse", believes Rémy Baume, who refuses to attribute the sector's difficulties to fast fashion and cites as an example "the double-digit growth" of the American Bloomingdale's.

Le Printemps claims 2.5 million annual buyers in its network. It “does not target one clientele rather than another”, assures Rémy Baume but, he concedes, its orientation “can attract more” those “who like comfort, great discretion”. With 44.

000 m2, its flagship, boulevard Haussmann in Paris, is according to him a “more intimate setting” than the 70,000 m2 of the neighboring Galeries Lafayette. The group has 20 Printemps stores in France, in Doha (Qatar) since 2022 and in New York (United States) since 2025, and does not plan any openings abroad, according to Mr.

Balm. “We are in the green” The company also includes nine Citadium stores and the Place des Tendances e-boutique. It does not wish to communicate its turnover, which amounted to 1.7 billion euros during its staggered 2017-2018 financial year.

“We are in the green,” assures Mr. Baume, but “we have work to do” to improve profitability. The demonstrations of recent weeks have cost "several million euros" due to damage or a loss of income, according to the leader, who is pleading to facilitate the opening of businesses on Sundays.

At the end of 2021, Le Printemps implemented a job protection plan (PSE), leading to the elimination of several hundred jobs and the closure of three sites. In March 2026, its shareholders recapitalized the group to the tune of 140 million euros to cover in particular its "existing losses", of more than 79 million euros after allocation of the result for the financial year ended in March 2025, according to a report revealed by the specialized magazine LSA and consulted by AFP, on which management has not commented.

Machine-translated from French