A roller coaster year - 2022 review (part 1)

I have often been asked if I am now alone in charge. Well no, not really, and fortunately! I am lucky to have a solid team with me and on whom I rely heavily.

I was also asked the question “but why don’t you take Geoffrey’s place?” and the answer is simple: that’s not what I want. And that's not where I'm best.

Of course, as the largest shareholder and president of BonneGueule, I have a say in all strategic decisions, but I don't want to get my hands dirty, or rather, not in this dirty mess. .

Rather than creating and thinking about a financing file, I prefer to think about an outdoor line for example. The fit of a shirt. In the crotch of a pair of pants. On the collar of a polo shirt. Or to “Enterprise and (above all) be happy” . We had a cordial relationship for a few years, but 2022 was the year we became friends.

Faced with this heavy entrepreneurial context, I had a little creative oasis: with my little sister's partner, Kilian Arzel , I started working on the remix of a piece that is very close to my heart: Titanium by David Guetta , in an epic and orchestral vibe. I have unconditional love for this piece, where Guetta is at the top of his game, but that's not the point...

These sessions in this studio were real breaths of fresh air for me , and this little remix would play an increasingly important role in 2022...

…which unfortunately came to fruition

At the end of March, faced with much lower growth than expected, we had to face the facts:

• we would not be profitable in 2022,
• our margin would decrease because raw material costs would increase but not our prices
• numerous production delays would put even more turnover in strong uncertainty

Apart from that, we also had important changes in the team at that time:

• the departure of Geoffrey, obviously, with the recruitment of his successor which took longer than expected (and which we have not yet found),
• the departure of our store director, competent and appreciated by all, who left for family reasons (Kilian is brilliantly replacing him today),
• the departure of our financial manager, because his partner was transferred abroad,
• recruitments which were slow to materialize on the product side,

In short, we had an internal organization that was shaken up quite a bit in 2022 , and that created a lot of points of frustration and friction that had to be resolved one by one.

Even Bertrand, who had distinguished himself by his “robustness” in the face of everyday crises and problems, was beginning to tire.

Indeed, it had a scope which suddenly expanded with the departure of our former store director, Laurent, (who had to leave (very) reluctantly for personal reasons) and the construction of the new site which merged our eshop and our media.

The situation was therefore frankly worrying. But still on the team side, there was good news in April 2022…

Florian’s return, 10 years later…

…as marketing director/CMO.

A few words about this organizational change: originally we had a branding manager and a digital director but this organization was not working very well. It created too much friction between these two poles.

So, with Bertrand, we imagined instead a tighter and simplified marketing team, where the branding and the e-shop part would be under one and the same manager: the marketing director and to merge the two poles into one.

Florian was one of our very first employees, who was there with Geoffrey and me from the first day in 2012. It was he who imagined and set up our customer service which has such a good reputation.

He then left to sail towards new adventures. And finally, he decided to come back to us, with all his acquired experience.

As a co-founder, it is very reassuring for me to have someone like Florian in such a key position as marketing director, because he knows the values ​​of BonneGueule perfectly and is a valuable guardian of them . He will fully know how to instill them in his team.

Stay tuned for more

That's the very business part of this article, and you can stop here if the “big picture” is enough for you.

Now we're going to get into more... personal topics. Because what I want to give above all is a message of hope and, why not, remove a taboo on the internal doubts that an entrepreneur can go through.

Continued to the next episode!

Still this growth problem...

But the real problem is that even if we continued to grow painfully, our payroll remained too high in relation to our turnover.

We are therefore organizing a meeting with our shareholders to explain the situation to them and find solutions.

I remember it very well, because we made decisions with serious consequences, some of which frankly frightened me.

We also see that the portion of people who switch from our media to the e-shop is tiny, and that if we could even double this figure, the gain in turnover would be very significant.

This is what led me to make the most controversial decision of 2022: reviewing our editorial strategy and refocusing it on our brand.

I came out of this intense meeting exhausted, and I remember doing the only thing that could do me good in this kind of moment: put on my headphones, listen to my remix of Titanium, put on a pair of sneakers, a base layer in Polartec Power Grid and run 10km along the banks of the Seine facing the setting sun.

(And I remember saying to myself: “Hey, I have to think about writing this moment in the review article.”)

I knew the next few months were going to be grueling, but not necessarily for the reasons I had imagined...

Coping: the change in editorial strategy

With Geoffrey's departure and our price change, let's deal with another elephant in the room: the change in editorial strategy.

There were two observations underlying this change:

• this problem of traffic and growth
• and the fact that many of our readers did not know that we had a clothing brand, others did not understand why there were not the brands that we mentioned in our columns in our stores,

This last reflection was fueled by a scene that I had experienced many times: spontaneously, people came to tell me that they loved BonneGueule (in the evening, during the day, in the street, at professional events, etc.) but when I asked them if they knew of the existence of our brand, the answer was negative. It was driving me crazy.

And I could understand it, because at the time, we had two separate sites: our e-shop and our media.

I know that for the most loyal among you, this observation may seem crazy , especially in view of the articles presenting our clothes regularly published, but it was a reality.

In terms of figures, I'll say it again, but the proportion of media traffic to the e-shop was far too small compared to our overall traffic, which is why Geoffrey had been thinking about merging the two for several years.

But it wasn't enough.

I wanted an editorial more aligned with our brand, more refocused, because I found that on our clothes, there was a wonderful area of ​​expression that we weren't exploring enough.

And this meant making a major change in the history of BonneGueule: putting the editorial division, which was directly under my responsibility, into the marketing division.

Therefore an editorial center under the responsibility of a “brand content manager” rather than a pure editor-in-chief. Brand Content Manager who himself reports to Florian, our marketing director.

Florian knows the BonneGueule values ​​perfectly (and defends them all the time) so I think the editorial will be in good hands.

But making this decision hid another, which worried me a lot the first time I looked it in the face: if the editorial department was under the responsibility of a brand content manager, himself under the responsibility of Florian , and if I wanted an editorial more in line with our clothing, the position of editor-in-chief therefore became obsolete, and I therefore had to consider parting ways with Christophe, with whom I had excellent working relations.

Honestly, it was one of the most painful decisions I had to make in my small entrepreneurial career . Because this was a major change in the BonneGueule before.

A decision that was going to turn around in my head almost every day, from April 2022 to October 2022 and I was dreading this moment when I was going to have to decide for good. Because in the end, it was up to me to decide and take responsibility.

And the day I had to announce it to Christophe is easily in my top 3 most difficult days of 2022.

A decision that sometimes continues to come back to haunt me, it would be a lie to say otherwise.

I envy entrepreneurs who manage to make decisions with serious consequences without ever doubting, without ever saying to themselves “did I really make the right decision?”, without asking questions.

This is not my case.

Moreover, Christophe , who has very solid managerial experience and in the media sector, is thinking of retraining in coaching or “talent management”, do not hesitate to contact him if this might interest you!

Finally, there is one last reason why I strongly believe in this organizational change: I think I was a bad N+1 regarding the editorial department. Yes really.

I think I should have had a stronger, clearer, less indecisive vision and been more present alongside Christophe.

Does this mean I no longer want to touch the content? No of course not ! And I talk about it a little later in the article.

And in fact, let's now address a question that interests many of you: what content to create after such a change? This is what we are going to see.