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Scarves, umbrellas and the classic trench are key to CEO Joshua Schulman’s revival of the luxury brand

New Burberry CEO Joshua Schulman is refocusing on classic British style to revive the brand’s cachet.

Burberry aims to recapture its universal luxury appeal after a period of pursuing a niche aesthetic.

Schulman is re-emphasizing classic items like trench coats and scarves, while recalibrating pricing.

LONDON—Soon after taking over as Burberry’s BRBY -0.24%decrease; red down pointing triangle chief executive last summer, Joshua Schulman popped into the company’s Fifth Avenue store in Manhattan. The shop floor was cavernous, minimalist and showcased select $3,000 handbags.

What he didn’t see were any $500 umbrellas—the type of higher-volume accessory that, along with trench coats, made Burberry an icon of functional, aspirational luxury for well over a century. As an American who had long admired the British brand, Schulman was puzzled.

“I’m like, why don’t we have hats or umbrellas on the floor?” he recalled. A store employee told him that went against the company’s visual guidelines, which called for sparse setups and no mannequins, another thing that struck Schulman as odd given that Burberry sells a full wardrobe. “I said, ‘Well, why don’t we try?’”

Employees quickly retrieved some from the stockroom and propped them up prominently. As luck would have it, a rainstorm soon blew through, and several shoppers bought umbrellas with Burberry’s signature check pattern within the hour.

One year in as Burberry CEO, Schulman is taking a back-to-basics approach to reviving the cachet of a company that once helped define British culture around the world. He is unwinding some of the brand’s overly ambitious detours and refocusing on what built Burberry’s name: classic British style and clothing designed to withstand the elements. A new ad campaign proclaims “It’s Always Burberry Weather” and features Olivia Colman, who played Queen Elizabeth II on “The Crown,” in a quilted jacket and Liam Gallagher of Oasis in a parka ahead of the ’90s British rock band’s reunion tour.

“Some of this is about slicing and dicing the numbers and looking at deep analysis,” says the 53-year-old in an interview in his office at Burberry’s London headquarters near the Thames. “And some of it is just leaning into the assets that we have already and celebrating who we are.”

Since its founding in 1856 and Thomas Burberry’s invention of weatherproofed gabardine fabric designed to withstand the British climate, Burberry has outfitted polar explorers, soldiers and royalty. A young Princess Diana was frequently photographed in her Burberry trench, establishing the coat as a symbol of understated aristocratic style. By the late 1980s, it was becoming the uniform of London’s club kids and fashion outsiders. The shift diluted its luxury image; it was too everywhere. In the 2000s, the brand mounted a comeback, running ads with the likes of Kate Moss and aristocratic model Stella Tennant that blended heritage with edge.

In recent years, a series of CEOs and designers tried to catapult Burberry into the top tier of the fashion world with avant-garde runway looks and bags at prices that rivaled Louis Vuitton.

The timing couldn’t have been worse. As Burberry tried to push upmarket, the luxury industry turned. Consumers cut back amid economic uncertainty and balked at prices that had soared during the pandemic boom in demand. Sales were hit especially hard in China, the world’s largest luxury market.

Burberry was caught in an identity crisis.

The brand, Schulman believes, had lost focus, pursuing a niche aesthetic at the expense of its more universal luxury appeal.

And because Burberry is the U.K.’s only global luxury brand—as well as the marquee name at London Fashion Week—its missteps have wider implications for British fashion as a whole.

“When it falters, it exposes how heavily the system depends on a single brand to lead,” said Andrew Groves, a professor of fashion design at the University of Westminster.

Other fashion rivals are privately owned (Chanel) or part of sprawling conglomerates (Gucci or Dior), but Burberry is on its own as a company and publicly traded. That puts more pressure on Schulman to turn things around, despite the weaker luxury market, and fast.

In May, Burberry announced a second annual decline in sales and a net loss for the fiscal year ended in March. Burberry’s share price is down more than 50% since early 2023. Schulman moved quickly to overhaul the executive team and announced plans to cut roughly 1,700 jobs by 2027—nearly 20% of its global head count.

The oldest of six children, Schulman grew up in Los Angeles. As a boy, he had his nose in Women’s Wear Daily, known in the industry as the “fashion bible,” and corporate annual reports. He would memorize the layouts and square footage of major department stores from company filings.

“I was a very strange child,” he admits with a laugh.

When Nordstrom announced it would open a store nearby in West Los Angeles, Schulman, then around 13 years old, wrote to one of the company’s leaders to say he was “ecstatic.” The executive wrote back, and he’s kept the letter ever since.

Around the same time, Schulman got his first job at a children’s clothing boutique in Beverly Hills. Kris Kardashian came in to shop for her young children. So did Kathy Hilton, for her daughter Paris. Schulman knew the regulars by name and paid close attention to their tastes. He joined the owner on buying trips, bringing back Versace and Moschino for kids.

“A lot of what I learned was in those four walls,” he says. He was convinced he’d rocket straight to being CEO of Bloomingdale’s.

After college at New York University and then Parsons School of Design, Schulman landed his first job in fashion at Perry Ellis, an American menswear brand known for its dress shirts and slacks. The company was in turmoil. It had just parted ways with Tom Ford—who would soon reinvent Gucci—and brought in Marc Jacobs, whose now-legendary Grunge collection also got him fired.

Schulman quickly learned the risks of misalignment between creative vision and corporate leadership.

A few years later, in 1997, he joined Gucci. There, Schulman was responsible for the commercial side of the ready-to-wear business, working closely with Christopher Bailey, who was head of women’s design. Bailey later jumped to Burberry.

Schulman kept a close eye on Burberry as Bailey led a revival of the brand, and Schulman’s interest deepened when he relocated to London to run Jimmy Choo from 2007 to 2012.

“Burberry was like the shining city on a hill,” he said.

A succession of CEOs—five since the turn of the century—have tried to push Burberry higher up the luxury ladder, with some experimenting with less traditional styles like an urban, sports-luxe aesthetic.

Burberry built out a network of global flagships and tightened control over its image. It gave up profits from high-volume licensing deals in Spain and Japan, pulled back from discount-friendly department stores in the U.S., and stripped out promotions from full-price boutiques.

The push accelerated during the pandemic. In late 2022, the company hired designer Daniel Lee and leaned hard into expensive handbags. Burberry increased prices on leather goods by 60%.

“It’s been a mistake for them to raise prices like they did and to try to carve out a whole new lane for themselves,” says Pete Nordstrom, president of the Seattle-based Nordstrom department store, one of Burberry’s most important wholesale partners in the U.S. “That’s going to have a negative impact with customers—and it has.”

Meanwhile, Schulman was on a fast track through some of America’s biggest fashion names, including Coach and Michael Kors.

Schulman was in talks to bring more fashion know-how to Burberry as a potential board member in spring 2024, just as Burberry’s strategy was unraveling. The company had issued a profit warning and seen its share price tumble. Shareholders were losing patience.

Instead of a board seat, Schulman was named CEO.

On his first day, he stood before staff at Burberry’s London headquarters and delivered a blunt diagnosis: The brand had drifted too far into niche fashion. It needed to capitalize more on its roots—trench coats, scarves, the classic red, white, black and tan checks.

Within weeks, Schulman convened a 200-person session of designers, merchandisers, product developers and marketers. Burberry had narrowed its appeal too drastically, he told them, focusing on the “opinionated customer” while neglecting others who he called investors, aspirers, hedonists and conservatives.

“We had left behind the broader universe of luxury customers,” he says.

One symbolic casualty of that shift was the classic Burberry polo, historically with an embroidered equestrian knight or checked trims.

“We had replaced that with a more anonymous polo shirt…at a much higher price point,” Schulman said. “Our customer didn’t respond to that.”

Pricing has been recalibrated: Schulman is charging a premium where the brand has authority—particularly outerwear and trench coats, which can run upward of $3,400—while pulling back in categories like handbags, where Burberry’s credentials are weaker.

He is also highlighting globally recognizable symbols of Britishness—but with a sharper eye on how they would resonate internationally with, say, an American like himself. Internal data revealed a recurring problem under the previous leadership: Campaigns aimed at showcasing Burberry’s “modern British luxury” aesthetic struck a chord in the U.K., but often failed to resonate as strongly abroad.

In the fall, Schulman unveiled an ad campaign tied to the reopening of Burberry’s New York flagship that featured British model and actress Cara Delevingne in front of London’s iconic Big Ben. “It may not be the most subtle reference, but it’s globally recognizable,” Schulman said. “You can see the Eiffel Tower in ads for three or four of our French competitors all the time.”

Nowhere is Schulman’s shift more visible than in how Burberry displays scarves, once tucked away in drawers. New “scarf bars” prominently showcase cashmere scarves in an array of patterns and colors that can be monogrammed on the spot.

Investors are optimistic. Same-store sales fell 5% in the six months to March 29—an improvement from the 20% drop in the previous half. Burberry’s share price is up about 30% this year.

At a showroom in Paris shortly after Schulman joined Burberry, Nordstrom says his buyers and merchandisers were ready to lay out everything that wasn’t working. Before they could start, Schulman cut in: “You don’t need to tell me. I know. We’ll fix it.”

Schulman and his team are eager to work collaboratively, says Nordstrom. “Their time to shine is really the second half of the year, especially fall and winter. I think we’ll know a lot more then.”

With its recent focus on more accessibly priced products, some warn the brand risks drifting into “affordable luxury” territory—a profitable but less rarefied space, closer to Coach. Two former Burberry executives contend that the shift to the higher end would have worked if given enough time, or if the broader environment hadn’t changed so dramatically.

“It takes years to elevate a brand,” said one. “Burberry started that process, but it’s very hard to achieve when you’re a publicly listed company. Shareholders want results.”

Schulman insists he has no intention of turning Burberry into a “British Coach,” emphasizing that the ambition remains firmly rooted in full luxury positioning. First, however, he needs to lure more customers with the kind of classic coats and scarves that made Burberry famous.

“We could be among those top five luxury brands in the far future,” he says. “That is the North Star for this business.”

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EU watchdog warns Ursula von der Leyen against rushing deregulation

European Commission risks eroding trust by using urgent procedures to cut red tape, ombudsman says

The EU’s independent watchdog has warned Ursula von der Leyen against rushing through deregulation without the proper safeguards, intensifying pressure on the commission president ahead of a no-confidence vote.

European Ombudsman Teresa Anjinho said that the commission risked eroding trust by pushing through its simplification drive without consulting civil society, warning against complacency as President Donald Trump rolls back oversight in the US. 

Simplifying the laws itself isn’t the problem, Anjinho told the Financial Times in an interview. ‘‘The problem is when you attach to the simplification urgency procedures that deviate from the normal legislative procedures.”

The commission has come under scrutiny over von der Leyen’s use of urgent procedures to fast-track the simplification of some climate laws introduced in her first mandate, as she tries to boost competitiveness by cutting red tape for businesses.

Von der Leyen is facing a no-confidence vote on Thursday over transparency concerns and allegations about bypassing parliament, the bloc’s only directly elected institution, while being too accommodating to EU capitals. In exceptional circumstances, the commission can propose passing legislation without going through parliament.

Separately, Anjinho has opened an inquiry into the commission’s review of corporate sustainability due diligence rules as part of its simplification drive, after NGOs complained that Brussels had broken its own guidelines. The commission’s proposals would water down rules forcing companies to track and report on human rights and environmental issues in their supply chains.

To act quickly, the commission did not consult with civil society organisations or conduct a so-called impact assessment of the new rules, which is usually required before they are tabled for adoption.

“The way these decisions are being perceived, . . . is that competitiveness is, in a way, coming at the cost of these legislative procedures and pre-established laws,” Anjinho said, warning that there was a perception that “these decisions are being taken behind closed doors, that they are being rushed’.’

The EU ombudsman can carry out inquiries and make recommendations to the commission, but they are not legally binding.

Following procedure is part of the democratic process, said Anjinho, who took office in February. “Democracy is something that should not be taken for granted.”

Anjinho, who previously served on the supervisory committee of the EU’s anti-fraud agency Olaf, has opened two other inquiries into the EU executive’s use of accelerated procedures. These are on amendments to agricultural funding giving farmers greater leeway in following environmental rules, and on rules to fight migrant smuggling, for instance including harsher penalties for related offences.

The latter was opened following a complaint by the NGO Picum, which alleges that “the Commission’s failure to conduct an impact assessment overlooks flagrant human rights violations” linked to the migrant smuggling rules, such as criminalising people who help migrants.

Anjinho said human rights impact assessments were particularly important to “evaluate the consequences and the risks of certain decisions”.

She acknowledged that the legislative process was time consuming, but said that “the procedures exist to guarantee also that there is fairness”.

“There are situations where you can derogate from these impact assessments, but they are normally exceptional,” Anjinho said, adding that she would now seek “clarification” from the commission.

The Portuguese official also warned against complacency in enforcing democratic norms, at a time when US President Donald Trump is abolishing watchdogs and regulations protecting citizens and businesses.

“The US is influencing geopolitically everything that we are talking about . . . from the simplification, the question of competitiveness, to defence,” she said.

Perfect Storm — how the west has wrestled with Moscow’s oligarchs and oil barons

Thane Gustafson’s economic history of post-Soviet Russia wonders how impervious Putin is to western sanctions

On a visit to interview President Vladimir Putin last year, the US conservative firebrand news host Tucker Carlson stopped at a Moscow mall to film a segment about how years of sanctions had impacted Russians’ shopping. As he strolled through a branch of Auchan, the French hypermarket chain, Carlson marvelled at the low prices and broad assortment of goods from other western multinationals. “Looks pretty non-sanctioned to me,” Carlson said, “but what do I know?”

The bounty (and Bounty bars) on offer were emblematic of Russia’s resilience to western economic pressure since Putin ordered the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Instead of returning to the empty shelves of the late Soviet era, most western consumer goods remain widely available. Russia’s oil exports fund the Kremlin’s splurge on defence and trickle into ordinary Russians’ pocketbooks. The technocrats who led Russia’s efforts to integrate its economy with the west are now the vanguard of the Kremlin’s fightback against sanctions.

Today’s economic warfare is rooted in three decades of failed attempts to draw Russia closer to the west, Thane Gustafson, a professor at Georgetown University, argues in Perfect Storm. Instead of drawing the cold war adversaries together, efforts to integrate Russia into the capitalist system gave each side powerful weapons against the other. When Putin’s tanks rolled into Ukraine in 2022, Kyiv’s allies responded by expelling Moscow from global markets and supply chains. Russia cut Europe off from cheap gas supplies and crowed that the continent would soon freeze.

Gustafson traces how the euphoria that greeted American-style capitalism’s arrival in Russia masked a brooding resentment at the Soviet empire’s defeat. Russians stood in lines for hours at Moscow’s first McDonald’s when it opened in 1990, but were less excited about swallowing triumphalist, often condescending advice from their western betters — or “spinach”, as former senior US diplomat Victoria Nuland put it. “I know you guys would like to come here and teach us heathens how to eat with a fork and knife and just to make sure we brush our teeth the right way,” the Russo-Georgian tycoon Kakha Bendukidze quipped.

In any case, the Russians had their own way of doing biznes. Boris Yeltsin’s liberal economic reformers lamented the lack of a Marshall Plan for Russia, as the US had arranged to rebuild Europe after 1945, but did much to discredit western capitalism themselves. Their “shock therapy” reforms immiserated millions, while a loans for shares deal to keep Yeltsin in power enriched a tiny coterie of oligarchs. As western companies leapt to get their hands on Russia’s riches, those who had already made it in biznes headed the other way. Inflows into the country totalled over $630bn from 1992 to 2020 but were dwarfed by an estimated $800bn of Russian money held outside the country.

This created a vulnerability that western sanctions have sought to exploit, limiting Russia’s ability to sell commodities abroad and import irreplaceable goods for its war machine with the proceeds. But predictions of economic disaster, made in Washington and Moscow alike at the war’s outset, have not come to pass. Gustafson finds the sanctions have been too incremental, often laxly enforced, and rarely with a clear goal in mind. The most successful have constrained Russia’s financial flows. He writes: “the Russian dependence on the western financial system became its greatest source of vulnerability”. Russia has proved skilful at evading those, too — as evidenced by the western components found in missiles that strike Ukraine, often smuggled through its ally China.

Gustafson holds out hope that what remains from Russia’s opening to the west could help the sides reconcile once Putin is finally gone. He even sketches out a future president’s speech in which Moscow renounces Putin’s imperialism, accepts its goals in Ukraine are unattainable, and rejects its dependence on Beijing.

Putin’s war, however, has laid new foundations that will be difficult for any successor to shake off. Power and wealth are in the hands of a venal elite in the security services. Sanctions have fuelled resentment even among an elite that once looked to the west. No western companies have made an effort to return to Russia. And those who have profited in their absence are in no rush to welcome them back. Or, as Putin put it last month when he backed efforts to block McDonald’s from returning: “Only cowards pay their debts.”

China could give luxury titans a run for their money

Local jewellers chip away at European dominance in domestic market as consumers move towards homegrown products

Chinese consumers have been increasingly turning to local brands across a wide range of industries. In sectors such as sportswear, beauty and electric vehicles, local names have surged ahead, driven by rising national pride and improving product quality. Yet amid this shift towards homegrown products, luxury jewellery remained a category resistant to change. For decades, European brands such as Cartier and Van Cleef & Arpels have held an unyielding grip on the Chinese market.

That dominance is beginning to erode. Driving this shift is local rival Laopu Gold, a once-traditional jeweller now leading a transformation in China’s high-end jewellery sector. Laopu reinvented itself by embracing Chinese designs, making 24-carat gold pieces adorned with culturally significant symbols such as dragons and phoenixes. These designs, rooted in heritage, have been popular among a new generation of affluent young locals seeking luxury that reflects their identity. 

Fixed pricing, exclusive product releases and a loyal fan base have helped give the company a unique position, winning market share as global peers struggle to localise fast enough to compete. Same-store sales at its flagship locations have more than doubled this year, while online sales have risen fourfold, reflecting continued sales momentum.

That position is reflected in its share price. Since its listing last year, shares of Laopu Gold have risen more than 14-fold, pushing its market value past HK$170bn ($21.7bn), surpassing Chow Tai Fook, long the dominant name in China’s jewellery market. It is now one of the fastest-growing luxury groups in Asia.

Yet Laopu remains heavily dependent on the domestic market, with growth closely linked to Chinese consumer sentiment and the investment appeal of gold. Unlike global luxury rivals such as Hermès or Richemont, it has yet to prove it can maintain premium pricing during economic downturns. It also lacks an international presence and diversification across product categories. While its revenue has been growing rapidly, more than doubling last year, it remains a fraction of the turnover of legacy groups such as Richemont or Chow Tai Fook. 

Despite these limitations, Laopu’s rise nevertheless marks an inflection point. China was already the most important buyer of luxury; now it is transitioning to become a credible supplier too. To join the ranks of global luxury groups, it will need to demonstrate resilience across market cycles and build a brand identity outside of local markets. But even now, Laopu shows progress that once seemed far beyond China’s reach.