Purposeful Luxury: The Strategic Playbook for Sustainability in Luxury Industries by Stéphane J.G. Girod will publish on 17^th September 2026 (Wiley), RRP £40.00

Why this book matters

• Explores how modern-day attitudes to luxury brands, amidst environmental deterioration, social polarization and geopolitical confrontation, may create a hostile market in which they lose their social license to operate – if brand leaders do not revise the contemporary model of luxury management. 
• The very first playbook of its kind, bringing together quantitative and qualitative research to offer practical frameworks and tools for the transformation required to turn planetary and societal risks into opportunity. 
• Argues for positive-impact sustainability as a strategic opportunity to strengthen the future-readiness of luxury brands, leveraging purpose for long-term viability. 
• Formulates a forward-looking and thought-provoking vision of what the luxury sectors of tomorrow will look like, giving their leaders an opportunity to decide where to play and how to win, and to invent the next model of luxury. 
• Written by a Professor of Strategy and Organizational Innovation at IMD Business School, and advisor to the world’s biggest luxury brands incl. CHANEL, Cartier and more. 

If by 2040-2045 the Earth’s climate continues to deteriorate at today’s rate, luxury businesses will be the first to lose their social license to operate – as society becomes hostile towards conspicuous consumption and satisfying basic human needs becomes a priority. 

And yet too few luxury brand executives have taken this challenge as seriously as they should. Perceiving the four inherent tensions between the values of sustainability and those of contemporary luxury, executives see sustainability as a reputational risk and extra cost to manage. In the context of prolonged recession, they should instead see it as a strategic opportunity to renew customer trust and guarantee future brand desirability through innovation.

In Purposeful Luxury: The Strategic Playbook for Sustainability in Luxury Industries, Dr. Stéphane J.G. Girod – an expert in luxury brand strategy and sustainable business transformation – draws on a decade advising the likes of CHANEL, Richemont and Audemars Piguet to offer a rigorous and practical roadmap for meaningful change.

The very first of its kind, Purposeful Luxury is a playbook on strategically embedding sustainability into luxury brand leadership. Drawing on interviews with executives and managers at the world’s most well-known brands, it includes large-scale research and analysis of over 1,000 sustainability and annual reports from 98 companies in beauty, automobiles, watches and jewellery, fashion, fine wines and spirits, and hospitality. 

Purposeful Luxury connects sustainability imperatives directly to the operational and brand-building realities of luxury businesses, including product innovation, reputational risk, supply chain management, regulatory exposure, marketing narratives, and customer engagement strategies. Importantly, the book shows luxury brand leaders how purpose can drive strategic choices that will resolve the four inherent tensions and create the next luxury management playbook for the challenging era ahead. 

Whether leading an established heritage maison or building an emerging luxury label, readers will find the strategic architecture needed to make sustainability a durable source of competitive advantage rather than a constraint on brand identity, growth, and long-term profitability.

About the author 

Dr. Stéphane J.G. Girod is Professor of Strategy and Organizational Innovation at IMD where, as a scholar and strategic advisor, his work focuses on how luxury brands can stay future ready in more turbulent times. He has extensively advised luxury brands and conglomerates including CHANEL, Puig, Lamborghini, Richemont and more, guiding industry leaders through the evolving demands of more virtuous business practices. Stéphane’s research has featured extensively in the likes of Harvard Business Review, Financial Times, Forbes and The Economist, and he has a PhD in Strategic Management from Saïd Business School, University of Oxford.