Burberry has parted company with their diversity chief after the luxury fashion house announced plans to cut 1,700 jobs worldwide.
Geoffrey Williams – who describes himself as a ‘key thought leader’ – was the global vice president of colleague attraction and inclusion at Burberry until he was let go over the summer.
The departure of Mr Williams is part of major cost-cutting measures which could see up to a fifth of the workplace culled leading to 1,700 job losses by 2027.
Burberry has claimed that the fashion house aims to save at least £60million with the cuts.
The job losses come after Burberry posted a £66million loss for the 12 months to March 29 after sales fell 12 per cent to £2.5billion amid a slump in China.
Burberry’s boss Joshua Schulman, speaking in May, blamed the UK’s punitive tourist tax and Donald Trump’s tariffs for the slump in sales.
It does remain a widely popular British brand and enjoyed a resurgence in popularity this summer during the Oasis reunion tour.
Burberry’s iconic check pattern was synonymous with the Britpop music scene in the 1990s and early 2000s.
In a nod to its popularity, Liam Gallagher son’s – Gene – donned a ‘family heirloom’ in the form of a Burberry jacket taken from his father’s 90s wardrobe.
Gene shared an image from backstage at the Manchester concert in which he posed with brother Lennon, 25, his cousins Anais, 25, Donovan, 17 and Sonny, 14, and Pep Guardiola – before an eagle-eyed superfan spotted the garment.
The fan penned: ‘Is that ya dad’s Maine Road top’, in reference to the jacket Liam wore on stage for Oasis’ April 1996 gig at Manchester’s Maine Road.
He responded: ‘The exact one. It’s a family heirloom.’
The scrapping of Mr William’s role comes amid a wider corporate retreat from diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI).
It comes after Donald Trump started a US crackdown on DEI which encouraged companies to ditch or scale back their policies or risk losing government contracts.
Burberry had previously been at the forefront of efforts to boost diversity.
In 2019, it laid out a series of diversity and inclusivity initiatives, including giving staff unconscious bias training and establishing an advisory board of external experts on culture.
But despite Mr William’s dismissal, the company says it continues to have a DEI programme focused on ‘fostering an open and inclusive culture’. And it had said it would be consolidating diversity efforts this year.
Burberry had previously announced the closure of a handful of stores and axed the night shift at its factory in Castleford to cut costs and reduce overcapacity.
Mr Schulman said this was ‘essential to safeguard the long-term viability of our UK manufacturing operations’.
The Daily Mail has approached Burberry for a comment.
