Some Paris Olympic Winners Say Medals Are Falling Aside, Need New Ones

• Some athletes who took podium spots on the Paris Olympics say their medals are deteriorating.
• Chaumet, a advantageous jewellery model owned by LVMH, designed the medals.
• The Worldwide Olympic Committee stated it’s going to substitute all “faulty” medals.

All that glitters shouldn’t be gold — and, as some athletes who competed within the Paris Olympics are discovering out, even gold can lose its luster.

Because the 2024 Olympic Video games final August, some Olympians who took house bronze, silver, and gold have taken to social media to complain that their medals are already exhibiting indicators of damage and tear.

They embody French swimmers Clément Secchi and Yohann Ndoye Brouard, who posted photographs on X of their gold medals in less-than-ideal form in December.

“Paris 1924,” Brouard wrote alongside crying face emojis in a put up with photos of his deteriorating gold medal.

The complaints mirror these of Crew USA skateboarder Nyjah Huston. Shortly after the Video games, he took to social media to indicate that his medal was already “wanting tough.”

“Olympic medals, we have to step up the standard somewhat bit,” Huston stated in an Instagram story.

The medals had been produced by the Monnaie de Paris, the French Mint, in partnership with the Worldwide Olympic Committee (IOC). Final week, the IOC stated in a press release to France 24 that it was reviewing complaints and changing “faulty” medals.

In a press release to Enterprise Insider, the Monnaie de Paris stated it first acquired medal complaints in August, after which it “modified the varnish” used and “optimized its manufacturing course of” to make them “extra proof against sure makes use of by athletes.”

It additionally stated it will substitute and identically engrave “all broken medals.”

Whereas the French Mint didn’t reveal the variety of medals changed, The New York Occasions reported on Tuesday that greater than 100 athletes have issued complaints for the reason that video games.

Questions have additionally arisen for LVMH, the luxurious conglomerate that partnered with the Olympics in 2024.

Forward of the video games, LVMH stated that its advantageous jewellery model Chaumet would design every medal — a process that the Maison launched into with “creativity and keenness,” based on the LVMH web site.

The Olympics marked one of many few highlights of 2024 for LVMH, a yr wherein its manufacturers reported disappointing gross sales amid a widespread downturn within the luxurious trade.

On the time, the Olympic partnership was a significant advertising and marketing increase for LVMH, which — in mild of the unlucky medal scenario — might now not be the case.

This yr is shaping as much as be extra promising for the French firm. Its inventory has risen sharply and and CEO Bernard Arnault’s web price is up nearly $18 billion since January 1 to $194 billion, placing him in fifth place on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

LVMH and the IOC didn’t reply to requests for remark from Enterprise Insider.