Gucci Hands the Reins to Francesca Bellettini as Kering Bets on a Turnaround

Gucci has a new captain at the helm. The Florentine fashion house, long regarded as the jewel in Kering’s crown, announced on September 17 that Francesca Bellettini will step in as chief executive, succeeding Stefano Cantino after a brief nine-month run. The leadership shake-up is part of an ambitious plan by Luca de Meo, Kering’s freshly appointed group CEO, to jolt Gucci back to growth after a rocky stretch.

Once the hottest name in luxury, Gucci has lately found itself chasing the momentum it enjoyed during Alessandro Michele’s era. Demand in China has cooled, and a wave of quieter, understated fashion has made its exuberant style look slightly out of step. Bellettini arrives with a reputation for calm focus — earned during her years steering Saint Laurent into a consistent performer for Kering — and she is expected to put structure behind a creative reboot.

Kering is reworking its own playbook to support that mission. The group is abandoning a layered management model that often blurred responsibilities, replacing it with a leaner chain of command. The goal is to help Gucci make faster calls on everything from regional pricing to capsule collections and marketing pushes. Bellettini is said to favour close coordination between creative teams, retail managers and merchandisers so that promising ideas can move swiftly from sketchpad to store window. For both Bellettini and Kering, the assignment carries unusual weight. Gucci still provides a hefty share of the group’s earnings, and its fortunes will shape how investors judge Luca de Meo’s strategy. A clean recovery could put the label back alongside heavyweights such as Louis Vuitton, which keeps breaking sales records through inventive collaborations and sharp control of its image. The months ahead will show whether Bellettini can balance creative risk with commercial discipline — and restore Gucci to the top tier of fashion’s power players.