• Identify and present in wirting a new case of European Luxury Value Creation based on inspiration from similar historical cases.
• Present and reflect on the managerial implications of luxury goods value chain in form of a business plan.
• Grasping the differences between "arts" and "crafts" and creatively discern how technology might hybrize them into new luxury propositions on the market

Luxury is commercially successful! Despite the economic crisis since 2008, European luxury brands have been unflinchingly successful, a few Euro-based multinationals such as LVMH, PPR and L’Oreal have overperformed many industrial blueships positioned in industries referred to basic needs (energy, water). This situation is partly explained by the opening of new market in emergent countries such as China, India and Brazil. According to most analysts, luxury, and especially its Euro practices, therefore reflects recent changes in global capitalism. Because luxury brands are omnipresent in the media, it is safe to say that luxury communication corresponds to evolutions in the dominant representations. This calls for an analysis of aesthetics and values in relation to the new influence of large luxury brands. How come artful European marketing and management is so in sync with global developments, and how can this enhance Euro global competitiveness?

Here recent research on the deeper differences between luxury goods, premium products and standardized industry products is very helpful. We realize how management rendering industrial success is utterly different from managerial mindsets in trendy products or art-based luxury goods. Temporal aspects play in important role where industry focus on the future, fashion on the present and collection goods need a retro-competence rooted in history and heritage as basic resources.
We explore the new partnerships between large luxury brands (managed by private European companies) and artists (in relation to art institutions ). For instance, three biopics of Coco Chanel were recently issued and were seen by millions of people around the world. Videos by Karl Lagerfeld (current designer of Chanel) were also posted on the Internet as « art advertisement ». This goes beyond the traditional « product placement » strategy, and it makes it difficult to set a limit between advertisement and creation. The partnership between Louis Vuitton and visual artist Takashi Murakami also questions the nature of each operations and roles within « creative industries ».
Within « creative industries », we may observe a reconfiguration of the hierarchy of talents and skills that were so far orchestrated by art institutions. Today we witness an ongoing fusion of culture with commerce; a process that renders European luxury artful.  
This leads us to reflect on the role of the media audience and visibility on the evaluation and management of skills and resources (copyright rules, contracts) and on the combinations of rare resources (precious materials, prestige locations) and skills (arts and craft traditions) to create unique offers. We also pay attention to the reinterpretation of artistic and cultural codes in a time where mixes, hybridizations and samplings are very popular.

In order to appreciate the specificity of  European strategies students are provided with toolbox of methods consisting of;

Market semiotics (images, symbols and styles and in particular brands)
Market exegesis and text-analysis (story-telling, stylistic devises)
Market aesthetics; identify specific experiences (feelings, emotions, senses) evoked by marketing and management methods

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Videos:
Coco Chanel (three biopics), on documentary by L. Prigent and online videos by Karl Lagerfeld
Diane Arbus (biopic)
The day before (Loïc Prigent, video documentaries on fashion-shows in the making, four houses)
Stellarc (performance)
The Stein (video documentary)
Videos : Cannes Festival, Oscar Ceremonies (with fashion in mind
Zara fast fashion