A Gucci store in China has today come under fire as five employees of the Shenzhen store in the countries Guangdong Province wrote to the Italian brands senior executives via an open letter in Chinese newspaper The Global Times citing that employees had even suffered miscarriage due to the strain of working in the store.
In the letter the listed around a hundred rules they had to adhere to, many of which, to be frank, are inhumane. The list included rules such as having to stand up for 12 hours with a maximum of 5 minute toilet breaks and having to work until 3 am to do inventory - 5 hours after the store closing time.
Each of the 5 members of staff are seeking 100,00 yuan (almost £10,000) in unpaid overtime wages, whilst a spokesperson for Gucci has released a statement saying that
'Gucci does not and will not endorse or tolerate the alleged malpractices' and 'Gucci has proactively engaged external consultants to conduct a comprehensive review to support ongoing actions that can enhance our organisational structure, the welfare and training of our people talent recruitment and retention and other business practices in China'
Seriously, between this, Frida Giannini stealing half of our models for LFW and the proposal that has convinced the rest of Milan and Paris to set their 2012 fashion week dates to clash with ours, remind me again why they are one of the most respected brands in the world??
