It is hard to imagine a tussle over a travel operator attracting the passions of a finance minister and a president’s son. But in France, homegrown corporations are a point of national pride, as are vacations themselves.
So when, in 2015, Chinese investors bought the storied resort chain Club Med, after the longest takeover battle in French history, seat belts were fastened for a bumpy ride.
Founded in 1950 by Gérard Blitz, a noted French Resistance fighter, Club Med—Club Méditerranée—became one of Europe’s most popular travel companies. It introduced a revolutionary concept in which vacationers paid a fixed rate for travel, lodging, board, and full use of the village’s sports and entertainment facilities. It appealed to singles and young couples with its cheerful resort “villages” and unapologetically French character, before the business hit a downturn in the 1990s as tourists sought out more sophisticated fare.
Since 2002, its C.E.O. and figurehead has been Henri Giscard d’Estaing, son of the former French president Valéry Giscard d’Estaing and scion of one of the surviving families of the country’s old bourgeoisie. Widely recognizable in turtlenecks and tweed, and married to a Dutch aristocrat, the 68-year-old Giscard d’Estaing added a touch of class and took Club Med dramatically upmarket. Gone were the Jacuzzi contests, in which guests and staff tried to cram as many of themselves into a hot tub as possible. So, too, were the family-style meals, and the plastic bracelets known as “bar beads,” which were once used as currency in the cashless resorts.
In came a concierge service and exclusive suites that were aimed at wealthy families rather than singles on the make. Shabby resorts were bulldozed. Prices went up accordingly. A week’s stay for a family in a suite in the Alpine resort of Tignes this February will cost a little more than $13,000. Nowadays, guests are as likely to be Brazilian, Turkish, or Saudi as they are European.
Standards sometimes fall short of expectations. A British lawyer and his accountant wife were this week awarded almost $5,000 in damages after their $8,000 all-inclusive family holiday at a Club Med resort in Provence was ruined by stale croissants and a moldy room. But things have certainly improved since Club Med’s lowest ebb, in 1992, when a plane chartered by the company crashed in Senegal, killing 30 vacationers.
Nevertheless, modern times bring modern challenges to Club Med’s traditional verities. Young staff in charge of fun are still called “gentils organisateurs” (friendly organizers), but they are not the selling point they once were. One long-term resort manager, who recently left the company, says Generation Z do not make natural “G.O.’s”. “They communicate with [text] messages,” he says. “They don’t talk.”
Club Med may not be perfect, but it remains beloved. Jean-Baptiste Bacheron, who runs Spirit45, a forum used by tens of thousands of Club Med–goers to follow the latest offerings around the world, says that despite the changes Giscard d’Estaing has made, the magic that made Club Med such a national treasure has not diminished. Entertainment is still central, whether it is trapeze lessons or skiing, and from China to Brazil, many G.O.’s are either French or speak French. The Chinese, for example, who “are crazy about Club Med,” love the “French touch,” he says. As travelers look for new and varied experiences, Club Med offers variety within a safe familiarity. “The club is a drug,” says Bacheron. “When you go there, you say, ‘I’m going to go back.’”
Gone were the Jacuzzi contests, in which guests and staff tried to cram as many of themselves into a hot tub as possible.
What the Chinese owners are looking for, however, is difficult to tell. Guo Guangchang, the 57-year-old C.E.O. of Fosun International, the company that bought Club Med, has been called China’s Warren Buffett. Arrested by anti-corruption police in 2015 and released days later, he remains one of the country’s most famous businessmen. Fosun is one of China’s so-called “gray rhinos,” companies backed by cheap state loans to build up huge asset portfolios.
In the mid-2010s, Chinese corporations snapped up scores of French vineyards and luxury-goods companies. Guo bought Club Med for $1 billion as part of a spending spree that included several European fashion houses, among them the Italian shoemaker Sergio Rossi and Lanvin, the oldest French clothing atelier still operating, plus an English Premier League soccer club, Wolverhampton Wanderers. In doing so, Guo, the son of a poor farmer, became the boss of Giscard d’Estaing, a man whose very name denotes centuries-old European privilege.
At first, the relationship was devoid of incident, with Guo reportedly giving Giscard d’Estaing free rein. That changed in 2022, when Guo appointed Xu Xiaoliang—a man with a real-estate background, who is said to speak neither English nor French, and who has no previous experience selling vacations—as the new head of his tourism group.
Then two new Chinese members were appointed to the Club Med board, making the French a small minority, and rumors swirled of the head office being moved to Shanghai, where Fosun is based. When Xu announced that new Club Med resorts were to open in China—it currently has 10 there—it seemed like the wholesale destruction of Club Med’s essential Frenchness.
Matters came to a head when Xu got rid of Giscard d’Estaing’s right-hand man, Michel Wolfovski, replacing him with a Chinese director, Yin On Choi. Briefings in the French press described Giscard d’Estaing allegedly shouting in anger and storming out of rooms at the replacement of his trusted number two, while tapping his political network to put pressure on Fosun.
Le Monde talked of “an internal earthquake.” At an investment summit held by France’s foreign ministry at the Château de Versailles, Bruno Le Maire, then President Macron’s finance minister, is alleged to have sent messages to Fosun executives that implied “France will not let this happen.”
Making matters worse was the fact that, due to the sputtering Chinese economy, Fosun spent much of last year selling off chunks of its empire and began exploring the sale of a minority stake in Club Med.
At a board meeting, one of the remaining French directors, veteran businessman Georges Pauget, is said to have exchanged “acid-filled missives” with Xu before slamming a door on him. “The Club is not a company that can be run in the Chinese way,” one observer to the boardroom drama said. “It was very tense,” says Bacheron.
Guo ended up moving the head office of Fosun’s leisure arm, which runs Club Med, from Shanghai to Paris. As its new director he hired Xavier Mufraggi, a former Club Med employee who had allegedly left Club Med on bad terms with Giscard d’Estaing in 2020. “So that’s not an easy relationship,” says the former resort manager. “He’s not a friendly recruitment.”
Giscard d’Estaing announced several joint replacements for Wolfovski in September, describing Club Med as “a global tourism champion with French roots.” He said: “In an uncertain macro-economic and geopolitical environment, it is necessary to be agile.”
The main factor preventing Giscard d’Estaing himself from being booted out was his status as the son of a former French leader. Such lineage matters in China. In his only public comments on the subject, he said: “I am not acting for myself but for the respect and sustainability of the company’s values.”
Indeed, Club Med has been a success story. With 73 resorts worldwide, the company turned over a record $2.1 billion last year. It plans to open 15 new resorts by 2027. It has benefited greatly from a resurgence in the popularity of all-inclusive vacations in Europe, especially luxury ones.
In December, Guo announced plans to take Fosun’s tourism group private and out of the public eye. During a New Year speech, he said he now wants to focus on tourism and health care. The offer to sell Club Med is seemingly forgotten, although the relationship between Giscard d’Estaing and Guo is still said to be tense. “Is it the calm before the storm? I don’t know,” says Bacheron. “For now, we don’t hear anything anymore.”
With the gray rhinos in retreat—according to the consultancy EY, in 2023 Chinese conglomerates bought only nine French companies, fewer than their acquisitions in Germany, Italy, Holland, and the U.K.—it seems that France’s travel jewel, while owned by China, will remain quintessentially French.
Richard Assheton is a writer living in Marseille
