OUR HISTORY

China has been in the roots of SINA Retail & Image company founder, Xavier VAN GAVER.

 

His mother , who studied Mandarin in Paris in 1956 at famous Institute of Oriental languages then worked and lived more than 20 years in Beijing to be the Chief Representative of a French company.

 

Xavier VAN  GAVER, since 1985 came to visit his parents in China at least twice per year and started several internship experiences in Beijing and Hong Kong to start his first job in Beijing in 1993 for a French Bank, Societe Generale.

 

After another  2 years working experience with his  brother in Hong Kong  he then joined LOREAL HK in 1996 to be sent back to Beijing and open the first LOREAL China legal entity  as  Manager of Beijing Representative office.

 

In 1997, noticing the great long term potential of Chinese market LOREAL Group decided to open a subsidiary in Shanghai .

 

Mr VAN GAVER was then relocated to Shanghai and took over the position of Merchandising director of LOREAL China consumer products Division with the mission of implementing Loreal Paris and Maybelline .

 

The DNA origins of SINA Retail & Image started at this period : the main distribution channel for beauty products in China was Department store, while the main channels in rest of the world for Loreal and Maybelline, where mainly Hypermarket and Drugstore channels.

 

Facing a totally different “Retail Environment’’ , it was decided to re invent locally  for the Chinese market a new and adapted In store merchandising.

 

After successfully having created and implemented  this unique merchandising  version  that became somehow an example for the rest  of the world, Mr VAN GAVER  went to LOREAL Group Headquarters in Paris to create and set up an International  Merchandising and Image department with the objective to set the international Merchandising guidelines for Loreal Paris, Maybelline and Garnier.

 

Later on, after 6 years of General Management position in LOREAL  Russia and LOREAL Taiwan, Mr VAN GAVER decided to come back to Shanghai and set up his own company.

 

Thanks to this unique pioneering retail creation successful experience for LOREAL in China, it became natural to create SINA Retail & Image and help  brands willing to enter successfully on Chinese market with ‘’SINA’’ as a name clearly stating the conviction that all the Retail trends will be more and more coming from China for the decades to come.