“I am very happy to see this illustrious magazine which has just celebrated its 75th anniversary joining the LVMH family,” rejoiced Bernard Arnault, who had coveted it for a long time, thanking “warmly Vincent Bolloré and Arnaud Lagardère” (CEO of group of the same name).
“I would like to thank Bernard Arnault and his family, in particular Antoine Arnault”, his son in charge of this file, also declared Arnaud Lagardère.
“With the support of the Bolloré family, whose culture and values we share, we are projecting ourselves into the future with strength and ambition,” he added.
In April, Arnaud Lagardère described the sale of the magazine, which is part of the group’s debt reduction strategy, as “heartbreaking”.
Paris Match came under the control of LVMH
An emblematic title of photojournalism combining major war reports and immersion in the privacy of stars and politicians, Paris Match still sells more than 440,000 copies each week.
By integrating LVMH, it becomes a brand in its own right, independent of the Les Echos-Le Parisien press group, also owned by the luxury giant.
This new company of around a hundred people, including more than 70 in the editorial team, will be chaired by Jean-Jacques Guiony, financial director of the LVMH group and member of the executive committee, who will retain his current position.
Recruitments
The editorial team remains led by Jérôme Béglé, its general director since 2023 who also becomes publishing director of the newspaper. Pierre-Emmanuel Ferrand, “until then general manager of Lagardère News (in charge) of press and digital” is appointed general manager of Paris Match.
Its new owner intends to “make his signature resonate with renewed ambition + the weight of words, the shock of photos +”.
This will notably involve an enhancement of the title’s photo collection and recruitment, according to a source close to the matter, while many journalists have left the title in recent years, against a backdrop of interference attributed to Vincent Bolloré.
It will also be a matter of “shortly doubling” the title’s 25,000 digital subscriptions and strengthening its presence on Instagram or TikTok, Jérôme Béglé explained to Le Figaro on Tuesday, also promising more geopolitics and news items in the subjects covered.
“Release”
The editorial staff of Paris Match, located at the Parisian headquarters of Lagardère News like that of Journal du Dimanche (JDD) or Europe 1, will move to new premises in 2025, while its management and other support functions will join those of the group Les Echos-Le Parisien.
Soon over, therefore, the “cantoche with Pascal Praud”, figure of CNews and Europe 1, quips a journalist from Paris Match who wished to remain anonymous.
According to him, “it is rather a liberation for the editorial staff” to leave the sphere of the Bolloré media, associated with the extreme right in the eyes of the left.
And to cite the multiplication over the “last three to four months” of front pages devoted to the Catholic religion dear to the billionaire.
“Highlighting religious subjects has never been a recent trend,” assured Jérôme Béglé to Le Figaro.
Paroxysm of the shocks experienced by the magazine, its society of journalists (SDJ), guarantor of respect for ethical rules, was scuttled at the start of the year.
In the summer of 2022, she was outraged by a front page dedicated to the ultra-conservative cardinal Robert Sarah, then by the dismissal of the political and economic editor-in-chief of Paris Match Bruno Jeudy, replaced by CNews figure Laurence Ferrari.
The latter now chairs the JDD and JDNews brands, a new weekly news magazine launched in September.
Less feared than Vincent Bolloré, Bernard Arnault is also the subject of criticism concerning his relationship to the independence of the editorial staff.
The first Paris Match of the LVMH era will be released on October 10.
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