This is a super article (https://www.ft.com/content/a27249e4-507c-11e9-9c76-bf4a0ce37d49). It is behind a pay wall but I read it for free on Twitter. If you go searching, the title is the same as this blogpost, but without the reference to Scheler.
V&R Chapter 5 explores the moral attributes of the estate, a model for business offered by Scheler. Alex Dumas, who is a serious reader, may not have read Scheler, but Hermes certainly matches the estate. Family-owned, localist, craft based, respectful of the land, free, proud of its French identity but embracing a wider civilizational role:
“For me, the first employee in Hermès is the craftsman,” says Dumas. “Then the second is sales associate and then there are the people like me in the office. In other companies you will see the marketing department being first . . . The concept I try to have for the company is to remain a craft shop.”
I’d love to watch Dumas and Cucinelli in conversation.
