REINVENTING THE FUTURE

Caroline Fattal, Chair of the 127-year-old Fattal Group, is a rare example of a fourth-generation leader of a family business. With a new structure and non-family CEO in place at the Beirut-based group, she’s focusing on her NGO efforts and giving back.

- LAYAN ABO SHKIER

It’s a well-repeated statistic from the Family Business Institute that among family businesses, around 30% make it through the second generation, 12% through the third, and only 3% to the fourth. Caroline Fattal, Chair of the Fattal Group and Founder of Stand for Women, is bucking the trend. “We are playing against the statistics,” admits the fourth-generation leader of her 127-year-old family business. As the first woman to head the conglomerate, she’s also tasked with ensuring that it transforms to survive even further.

The Beirut-based Fattal Group was founded as “Khalil Fattal & Fils” by Fattal’s great-grandfather Khalil Fares Fattal in 1897 in Damascus, when it was under the Ottoman Empire, before the creation of the modern state of Lebanon. At that time, the company represented some small commercial brands. Today, the group is a distributor of multinational brands and operates directly and indirectly across FMCG, healthcare, beauty and luxury, home appliances, office equipment, and electronics across Europe, the Middle East, and Africa.

It also has two subsidiaries—Excel Logistics and Société Nouvelle pour le Commerce et l’Industrie, which manufactures personal and home care products—operates in 15 countries and employs over 3,000 people, with 500 suppliers, 35,000 customers, and warehouses covering 100,000 square meters. Its partnerships include brands such as Unilever, Reckitt, Mondelez, Sandoz, Coty, Clarins, Novartis, and Pfizer.