Bottega Veneta Girds Management in China
MILAN — Bottega Veneta is restructuring its organization and is promoting Dario Gargiulo to chief executive officer of Greater China to elevate the brand positioning and client experience in the region.
Gargiulo is currently chief marketing and digital business officer. He joined Bottega Veneta in 2018 as chief marketing officer after a three-year stint at Diesel. Before that, he worked for 12 years at Heineken in various marketing positions in Italy, the Netherlands and Brazil.
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Samuel Diep, currently chief merchandising officer, who joined Bottega Veneta in 2020, has been promoted to chief merchandising and marketing officer, tasked with further strengthening the alignment between product and brand strategies.
Prior to joining Bottega Veneta, Diep led the merchandising team in China for Celine since 2019. Before that, he worked at Loewe and Saint Laurent in Paris for more than 10 years, in both collection and retail merchandising.
Ellen Kim, currently CEO of Japan-Guam and South Korea, and who joined Bottega Veneta in 2016 as general manager of South Korea, has been promoted to the position of CEO to the newly formed APAC region, adding Southeast Asia to her current perimeter. Prior to joining Bottega Veneta, she spent 10 years at Chanel in various positions.
All appointments are effective July 1, and each executive will report to group CEO Leo Rongone.
Further pointing to the brand’s increasing focus on the Asian continent, Bottega Veneta will stage a repeat show of its fall 2023 collection in Beijing on July 20, as reported. The collection was unveiled in Milan in February, the third by creative director Matthieu Blazy.
For Beijing, Blazy will develop dedicated new looks, and the show will build on Bottega Veneta’s growing brand presence in China, including its multiplatform campaigns for Chinese New Year.
In February, the brand, which quietly left Weibo two years ago, returned to the Chinese social media platform, a strategy that is helping it gain broader visibility in the Chinese luxury market. The brand has also been leveraging K-pop stars to drive online traffic.
South Korean boy band BTS’ Kim Namjoon, known by his stage name RM, attended Bottega Veneta’s fall fashion show in Milan last month, causing pandemonium inside the venue.
Mika Hashizume is a frequent collaborator of the brand in the Chinese market. The Japanese American heartthrob with more than 2.4 million followers on Weibo gained popularity for competing in the Chinese singing survival show “Chuang 2021.”
Last year, Bottega Veneta took over part of the Great Wall to celebrate the Chinese Lunar New Year.
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