Mediapart and the EIC sent a long list of questions to Gucci, Marco Bizzarri and his assistant, Piero Braga, Robert Triefus, and also to the former human resources director of the brand. We received no response of any kind.
We also sent numerous questions to the Kering group, with a request to interview its chief executive François-Henri Pinault. The group declined to offer precise answers to our questions, nor were we granted an interview. Instead, we received the following statement in French by email, dated March 14th, and which is translated here by Mediapart:
“The existence of the company Kering Holland NV, formally Gucci Group NV, does not provide a tax advantage to the Kering group. It originates from the history of the Group: before its acquisition by PPR, Gucci Group was a company listed in Amsterdam, and up until 2012 minority shareholders remained in the capital of the company.
The existence of the company Kering Luxembourg SA does not provide a tax advantage to the Kering group. Also, it is a falsehood to say that Kering Luxembourg SA has no activities nor staff in Luxembourg.
LGI is an important distribution and logistical platform created in the 1990s, before the taking of control of the Gucci Group by PPR. It is at the heart of international distribution activities (managing stock, logistics, billing, management of the supply chain) of the brands of the Group and constitutes an important industrial installation with more than 600 employees. Each of the companies of the Group established in Switzerland exercises a real economic activity directly linked to the commercial activity of the brands of the group. As such, the Group pays in Switzerland taxes due, in accordance with the law and the fiscal status of the company, and its situation is well known to the Swiss, Italian and French tax authorities.”