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Together Group Aims to Become the LVMH of Luxury Agencies

On May 27, 2025, London-based Together Group announced its 14th acquisition: Obo, an experiential studio best known for fashion shows and live events. The same day, Vogue Business ran an interview with the group's chief executive under the headline "Can Together Group build the LVMH of luxury agencies?" The headline is the magazine's question, but the comparison is partly the company's own. Here is who Together Group is, what it has bought, and what the LVMH comparison does and does not mean.

Who is behind Together Group

Together Group was founded in 2017 by Brad Fry and Paul Sheehy. It is led by Dr Christian Kurtzke, who joined before the initial funding was secured. Kurtzke is a former chief executive of Porsche Design and of porcelain maker Meissen, and was earlier a principal at Boston Consulting Group.

According to Vogue Business, the group is backed by institutional investors, including PGIM and Cheyne Capital, and by family offices, while the group and its agency founders hold the majority of shares. It declined to say how much it has raised.

The model is built around founders. When the group announced its first agencies in February 2022, it said each would keep its own identity, culture and senior leadership, with founders becoming shareholders in the group. "For us, it is not a means to an exit," said Fergus Lawlor, Purple's chief executive, in the 2022 announcement.

Fourteen acquisitions in four years

The buying started later than the founding. Vogue Business dates the first purchase, PR firm Purple, to 2021. In February 2022 the group announced stakes in five founder-led agencies: Purple, King & Partners, Noë & Associates, Construct and Hot Pot China, with more than 300 staff and 14 offices between them.

Social agency Folk, crisis communications firm Seven Dials City and foresight consultancy The Future Laboratory also joined in 2022, North Six in 2023 and Dubai agency Frame in 2024. The next three deals were all digital: Metajive, architectural CGI studio Visualisation One and digital twin specialist Imerza. Obo is number 14. At the time of the deal, the group had more than 675 staff across 19 locations.

Why Obo

Obo was founded in 2000 by René Célestin, who spent 12 consecutive years as creative director and head producer of the Victoria's Secret fashion shows. It has offices in Paris and London, has worked on the L'Oréal Paris shows for the past six years, and counts Saint Laurent, Celine, The Row, Bulgari and Armani among its clients. Célestin stays on as chief executive.

The Olympic link is real, but often overstated. Obo is one of the founding partners of Paname 24, the company that produced the opening ceremonies of the Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games. Some coverage, Vogue Business included, says Obo orchestrated the opening ceremony. The more precise version is that it was one of the partners behind the production company.

Kurtzke called Obo "the creative agency and supervising producer trusted by leading brands and destinations for their brand-defining experiential moments". What drew the group, he told Vogue Business, was its use of digital twins: "Obo creates digital replicas of the event environment that are dynamic and time driven — venue, scenography, audience flow, lighting and camera positions — before anything is built physically." That fits the three digital deals before it.

Where the LVMH comparison comes from

The phrase "the LVMH of luxury agencies" is the Vogue Business headline, posed as a question. In the interview, Kurtzke did make the comparison himself, but about how the group treats the businesses it buys, not about its size. "It's all too easy to become industrialised, but the way we want to retain and manage brands is much closer to an LVMH, where we bring founder-led or family-owned brands, agencies or studios into our portfolio and then nurture their growth," he said. "It's very different from the industrial paradigm where we acquire your brand, then in a year it's absorbed into a master brand."

None of the sources cited here describes any ownership or partnership link with LVMH itself. In the group's 2022 announcement, LVMH appears only as one of Purple's clients. Vogue Business names the group's closest rival as The Independents, whose agencies include PR firm Karla Otto. Kurtzke says that group is "very much focused on fashion and on fashion shows, whereas we are broader."

What the comparison tells us

It is a claim about governance, not scale. Kurtzke's point is that acquired agencies keep their names, founders and cultures instead of being folded into one master brand. That is the fair test to judge the group by.
The bet is on experiences and technology. Obo and the three digital deals before it point the same way: live events backed by digital twins. Whether clients buy that as one joined-up offer, rather than agency by agency, is still open.
Founders are both the asset and the risk. A model that sells itself on keeping founders in charge depends on them staying. The real test comes when founders do want to leave.

Update: what happened next (October 2026)

This article was first published on May 28, 2025. Here is how the story has developed since then:

September 2025: In a WWD interview, Kurtzke said: "The luxury groups of the future will no longer be based on hard products, but on experiences, wellness and quality of life." WWD still counted 14 agencies, and said Obo's Olympic work came "via its affiliate Paname 24".
February 2026: Together Group signed up to roll out Multiply.co, an AI platform for creative agencies, across its 14 agencies. "We use AI to empower our creative teams and enrich creative conversations — never to replace them," Kurtzke said.
April 2026: Purple launched a talent division with the independent talent agency August. The two operate as "August at Purple", sharing clients, resources and offices. WWD reported it as a partnership, not an acquisition. In May 2025, Kurtzke had told Vogue Business there would be "some activities on the talent side in the near future".
October 2026: No further acquisition has been announced since Obo, as far as public coverage shows, and no change in leadership or ownership has been reported. Kurtzke was still chief executive in the February 2026 coverage. The group's website now lists 15 agency brands, including August at Purple.

Fourteen deals built the portfolio. Whether the founder-led model holds as the group grows will decide if the LVMH comparison sticks.

Sources

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