Philippe Ginestet: Retail genius

The art of the deal is in Philippe Ginestet’s blood. His parents were livestock traders and, by the age of 12, Ginestet was accompanying them to fairs. Four years later their son had had enough of school and decided to leave, much to the disappointment of his mother and father. His quest to make them proud and stand on his own two feet saw the teen leave the safety-net of his hometown and head north, to work as a stablehand in Normandy. When that ended abruptly, a move to the big smoke followed, where he found work as factory floor sweeper in Paris.

His first regular job was as a door-to-door salesman of Electrolux home appliances, at which he excelled, but only after being taken under the wing of a more experienced and successful salesman.

In his 20s, and with a young family to support, Ginestet settled into life as a stall owner, criss-crossing France, often driving through the night to set up at various open-air markets. But when the time came for their son Alexandre to start school, the Ginestets decided they needed to put down roots, and so, decided to open their own store.

Lot of success
From his years running a market stall, Ginestet discovered the things that sold best among his clientele were essential everyday household items. Therefore, he decided to open a solderie – what an American would recognize as a dollar store. For the location, he chose Villeneuve-sur-Lot, a large town a handful of miles upriver from his birthplace of Sainte-Livrade-sur-Lot; for the name he fused the ‘Gi’ from his surname and the phonetic ‘Fi’, of Phillippe.    

Ginestet opened his first shop on the outskirts of Villeneuve-sur-Lot – he couldn’t afford to rent a premises in the center of town – on September 18th, 1981. Its shelves were filled with everyday items bought from the surplus stock of other retailers or the or discontinued lines of manufacturers.

"The art of the deal is in Philippe Ginestet’s blood"

His success in business – predicted by a fortune teller his parents had visited years prior – was not long in arriving. Aside from low prices, the decision to open on Sundays in an era when few French brick-and-mortar businesses did, proved crucial, or as the man himself puts it, “Sundays were always the day when we did the most business.”

The early eighties saw GiFi stores sprout up in surrounding towns, with a major early milestone being the first big-city store, in the southwest region’s capital, Bordeaux – run by his godmother. 

Many further milestones were to follow. In 1998, the brand opened its 100th store, and four years later the ribbon was cut on the first GiFi store outside of mainland France. Thanks, in part, to its program of international expansion, Gifi had 200 stores by 2003.  

Fast forward two decades and there are now over 1,000 of these temples of low-cost shopping in the world, including across Europe and in French overseas territories. Furthermore, thanks to the acquisition of iconic French discount retailer Tati in 2016, GiFi now has a significant presence in many city centers, including Paris.

A company in his image
Fostering a positive corporate culture is of singular importance to Ginestet. The entrepreneur, who received a bombshell cancer diagnosis in February 2020, just at the Covid crisis hit, prides himself on maintaining a close relationship with GiFi staff, which now number over 10,000. Ginestet likes to treat everyone the same: to him, having a different approach to your private and professional life makes no sense.

Philippe Ginestet has made it this far due to his ‘go for it’ attitude allied to a business ethos that goes all the way back to his early days watching how his parents operated at livestock fairs, not least their ability to cut out the middle man. But perhaps the main ingredient of his success is knowing what people want and how to give it to them at a price that keeps them coming back for more. 

Aside from his retail activity, Ginestet’s real-estate investments over the years have also made a big splash, none more so that his 2015 purchase and renovation of a chateau dating from the middle-ages in the village of Saint-Sylvestre-sur-Lot. The Stelsia is now a thriving 4-star hotel set in a 20-hectare estate complete with gourmet restaurant, bistro, lounge bar and wellness area. In addition to being a bucolic getaway for the well-heeled, Ginestet makes a point of entertaining GiFi staff here – a further illustration of his egalitarian philosophy in action.