BHV Marais is changing hands once again. At this rate, the Parisian department store will eventually be sold alongside the power drills and curtain rods on the third floor.

Having been acquired from Galeries Lafayette in 2023 by Société des Grands Magasins, the retailer is now being taken over by its own management team. Think of it as a corporate storming of the Bastille: CEO Karl-Stéphane Cottendin, flanked by his loyal generals from marketing, creative direction and human resources, has apparently concluded that the best way to save the ship is to become its captain, owner and stowaway all at once.

The new triumvirate promises a return to fundamentals. No more existential experiments. BHV will once again become what it has always been: a temple of DIY where you walk in to buy a light bulb and emerge three hours later with a stepladder, a Scandinavian lamp and a marital dispute.

This revolution comes in the wake of the Shein episode, which will go down in French retail history as the equivalent of opening a barbecue stand in the middle of a vegetarian convention. Despite protests from customers, brands, government officials and probably a few statues in the Marais district, the former owners persisted in their plan to bring the ultra-fast-fashion giant into this 170-year-old institution.

The outcome was spectacular. Several luxury brands left the premises with the discretion of a billionaire caught at an all-you-can-eat buffet. They complained of unpaid invoices and an increasingly awkward coexistence. For some luxury houses, sharing floor space with Shein felt rather like parking an 18th-century carriage between two abandoned electric scooters.

The new owners now promise to reconnect BHV with its heritage, its customers and perhaps even a few creditors. In retail, as in politics, everything moves in cycles: after the era of “faster and cheaper,” comes the age of the screwdriver, the oak stool and the designer lamp priced just high enough to reassure everyone of its quality.

Paris can breathe again. BHV will not, after all, become a giant online shopping cart with escalators.

FM