Profitability of operations returned to 3

The history of the FNAC has corresponded to the soixante-huitarde time, the image of the newspaper "liberation". Is its concept it not somewhat exceeded

On the contrary. Do you know that a Frenchman in two passes each year in one of our stores That we are present, with success, in eight countries That we have a website leader And that it is accelerating. Over the past three years, the FNAC recorded average growth of 8 of its turnover, 4 excluding new stores openings. It has improved its market share on all its product lines. Its already high, client satisfaction has increased. Its operating income increased by 10 on average each semester. With profitability before amortization of 5.5, it is in the range of its best European competitors, even though it can still advance. It opened eighteen stores! In short, it is in the heart of a consumption unprecedented phenomenon, the digital revolution, which it is a major player! Even in his wildest dreams, Edouard de Rothschild would expect similar fate for "parole"!

How do you explain this discrepancy with what one reads on the FNAC

The innovations that we put in place are perhaps not yet seen of all. But it will come.

And the malaise of the staff

There is no discomfort. There may be here or there well understandable concern, for example in the stores. But the reality is very majority membership of employees at the FNAC which moves forward and that reinvents. The hours of strike accounted for 0.06 of the hours worked in 2004 and 2005. That is less than the average for French companies in the private sector. And this decreases again in 2006. The FNAC has been, historically, trade unionism of confrontation. But on this plan, the FNAC modernizes quickly.

Do you have retreated or not on the principle of relocation of the headquarters

The annual rent of the seat of the FNAC, is EUR 12 million, or six stores operating income! We will find in Paris or in Paris area from the more functional premises at a reasonable cost. If we want to continue to lower prices, while improving profitability to fund our development, we gain in productivity. And I want to do on the costs of structure, not on the level of service offered to our customers.

This involves job losses

Redeployment to the stores. The headquarters of the FNAC, is 600 people. If we want a business more responsive and faster, need us shorter command lines. For the first time in the history of the sign, headquarters expenditures were stabilized in 2004 and dropped in 2005. They will drop again in 2006.

Amateur Boxing, and customary arms of iron in Air France or Canal , do you feel to be engaged in an arms of iron at the FNAC

Not at all. FNAC today, it is the first bookseller, the first record store, the first seller of personal computing, a major player in consumer electronics with 12 of market share. Profitability of operations returned to 3.5 in 2005 (and 5.5) before depreciation, amortization, smoothly, without conflict. It will continue to make progress in 2006. It is the solidarity of all teams.

You however are reinventing your business

This is true. FNAC also always did. The opportunities of the digital revolution, we are huge. Of course, some markets fall, sometimes strongly. This is the case for example of CD sales, which represent only a little more than 10 of our turnover. In the same time, the computer, flat screens, MP3 players, etc., representing 50 of our activity, explode literally! These are growth of 20, 30, 100 times per year. And profitability is very superior to the editorials products that are little known. New "products" appear: home delivery services, installation, support for new technologies.

That deal with the free download

In 2005, there were 1 billion illegally downloaded files and 20 million files downloaded legally. Can probably do better in the fight against the illegal downloading, for example in pursuit of "big" instead of "small" Internet access providers. But, above all, should be answered in the offer, with a very large catalog, attractive rates, securities to listen on any medium such as those without DRM Editor's Note: anti-piracy system that we sell, unlimited subscriptions like Fnacmusic has launched. Our site, opened two years ago, now represents 25 of the market and progressing

You have also announced the reduction of 25 of the surface of sale for disks and 40 of the workforce in record stores.

Three years of sales decline erased a decade of growth in the disk RADIUS. We are going to densify the surfaces without reducing supply, as the great English stores. We will redeploy in the order of one-third of the workforce to other jobs. To do this, we signed an agreement of method with the CFDT, CFTC, the Unsa, and the CFE - CGC on the "management of jobs". In the next three years, we will propose to the 1,000 employees of the disk, work photo, back-offices whose jobs are concerned, a mobility to the 1,000 positions created by the growth of technical products and the opening of new stores. And we have a reserve of jobs with, on the same period, 2,000 positions released by natural turnover.

FNAC launches on the periphery with a new concept different from that of downtown. Did you not gone too far

This is where occurs in half of the purchases of the technical and cultural products that we sell. And we would be absent While our identity, it is to offer all the discovery of the cultures and technologies! We have therefore opened a new format, adapted to the expectations of the consumers of these malls. The offer of cultural products is the same. The range of technical products is broader. How to sell is FNAC. And everything is done to a faster purchase path. We have only two months experience. But it is a full commercial success for the moment, with a turnover equal to or higher than an equivalent store in the downtown. And a customer satisfaction survey that explodes meters. In the next four years, we will open in a 20.

You also rely on the services. You have worked with Accenture to better your catch of Darty and other PC City

These services, home, linked to new technologies, are new to everyone. Accenture has been the Council of Best Buy in the United States, pioneer in the field. This is exactly what we want to do. This made us gain time on a market estimated between 500 and 900 million euros to five years, an additional 100 million euros of turnover potential for the FNAC on the same horizon.

And the international

Even though it is still in full development, international activity reached 26 million euros to operating income in 2005, increasing by 40. Countries such as the Spain or the Portugal profitability is higher than that of the France of the order of 7. The Brazil became profitable last year. The Belgium and the Switzerland will be in 2007. The Italy in 2008, out of openings. With 10 new stores per year, the international will double its turnover in five years, it will be EUR 2 billion.

You said that the FNAC was not for sale. The President of the spring had said the same thing and three months after PPR assigned its subsidiary.

After be clearly assured me that I could do, I told teams that I knew, namely that there is no record of dedication to PPR, that allegedly mandated banks were denied and the FNAC is not for sale.

You have however, said to have consulted bankers and fund managers

Nonsense! I have met no investment fund and I have not consulted a single banker on this subject.

Purchasing power seems to emerge as a major future presidential campaign theme. How to combat the living

Improve purchasing power, is first to develop employment. However, if I look at the distribution, it was deposits which cannot be relocated. And what is being done On the tax! It is a monumental mistake! In European countries that do not this, our FNAC have more employees than in France. These sectors sheltered from international competition, strongly employers of young and low skilled labour that are integrated and are formed, often neighbourhoods, it is a potential of 500,000 to 800,000 new jobs for our country! Well, it would change things.

You used to spend close to Laurent Fabius before your break on Europe. You was seen recently at a meeting of the diagonal, a club of "left sarkozystes." You, you would see Minister of Culture of Nicolas Sarkozy

As a leading distributor of cultural products in France, it invites me to a series of debates on the future of culture. It is normal. As to my opinions of citizen, they concern only me. I spend 100 of my time at the FNAC. My job is to be head of the undertaking.