Laurent Boix-Vives, 1926-2020

Rossignol’s iconic president for about half a century, Laurent Boix-Vives passed away on Thursday, June 18th at the age of 93.

Born in 1926, he purchased Rossignol in 1956 to turn-around the failing company into a world leader in the ski business. I had the pleasure and honor of working for Laurent Boix-Vives while at Lange from 1982 through 1986. 

Not only did this help me raise my young family, gave me some strong, practical experience in the boot business, facilitated my move to the Rocky Mountains when we set up a new R&D center in Salt Lake City, but it also helped me understand how to make a tricky seasonal ski business more financially viable.

He also cannot be dissociated from his very different, yet quite successful competitor, Georges Salomon, who left us a decade earlier.

Salomon was obsessed with the product, its marketing and a quest for innovation, whereas Boix-Vives who supported ski racing wholeheartedly, was more of a public person who loved the financial side of business and enjoyed contacts with the who-is-who of captains of industry and politicians.

Strikingly different but highly successful, both were the two bright pillars of the French ski industry and with Laurent Boix-Vives departure, they won’t be replaced any time soon...