2025 EHL Experiential Luxury Forum

An exceptional hotelier with a world of management experience earned exclusively with Four Seasons, Adrian Messerli knows that the brand’s people, and their dedication to genuine care, makes all the difference in luxury hospitality. From palace hotels in Europe to glittering skyscrapers in the Middle East to hideaway beach resorts in Africa, he is tasked with overseeing Four Seasons hotel operations across a diverse portfolio of more than 40 operating properties and 20 under development.

Whatever the address, Messerli believes hotel teams need strong leadership support to excel. He describes his personal style as “inclusive,” and his goal, he says, is to “bring out the best by giving people the opportunity to develop the services they provide.”

Hospitality has always been a good fit for Messerli, who was born in a ski resort village in the German-speaking region of Switzerland and raised in his parents’ fourth-generation family-owned hotel. They hoped he would be the fifth generation someday, but he had other priorities, including serving in the military and working for Swissair. In 2002, he achieved his degree from hospitality school and began his career that has now spanned 21 years.

Olivier Jolidon is a seasoned executive with over 20 years of international leadership experience in marketing, CRM, and analytics within the luxury sector. He holds an MBA from Manchester Business School and a Bachelor of Science from the prestigious Ecole Hôtelière de Lausanne.

Olivier has held senior roles at globally renowned luxury brands, including Global Head of CRM, Insights & Analytics at AMAN and Director of Digital & CRM at Estée Lauder, where he led high-impact, data-driven strategies to elevate customer experience and brand engagement.

His expertise spans managing complex CRM, digital transformation, and business intelligence initiatives across diverse international markets, consistently driving growth and innovation in the luxury hospitality and beauty industries.

With over two decades of leadership in luxury hospitality and cruise operations, Jens has built a career at the intersection of guest experience, operational excellence, and innovation. He has held senior roles across hotel and shipboard functions, shaping service culture and performance standards in some of the world’s most recognized luxury brands.

At The Ritz-Carlton Yacht Collection, he now oversees shipboard hospitality, guest experience, supply chain, Operational FP&A, and destination operations. Passionate about sustainability and forward-thinking strategy, he focuses on redefining modern luxury through operational agility, guest-centric design, and immersive experiences that blend leisure with cultural and educational enrichment.

Lucas Imhof is the Global Head of Hospitality at Audemars Piguet, where he leads the team responsible for designing immersive, meaningful experiences at the Manufacture in Le Brassus and across AP’s 80+ global points of sale. He is dedicated to creating environments where clients feel genuinely cared for. With 16 years of experience across luxury hospitality and fine watchmaking, Lucas has held key roles at some of the world’s finest hotels before joining Audemars Piguet in 2017 to lead the development of the brand’s own hotel project, the Hôtel des Horlogers.

From his childhood in Africa and Asia to his professional experiences in Thailand, Indonesia, Turkey, and Switzerland, Lucas had the chance to live in culturally diverse environments, where hospitality was omnipresent. For him, hospitality goes beyond set procedures and ceremonies: it’s a whole way of seeing things from a caring perspective. 

Dr. Florent is an Associate Professor of Marketing at EHL. His academic research focuses on consumers’ reactions to brand and product positioning strategies. His research integrates different perspectives from philosophy, sociology and psychology to better understand the mechanisms underlying consumers’ formation of attitude toward brands and products as well as the impact of such attitudes on consumers’ life aspects.

His work has been published in top-tier business journals such as Journal of Consumer Psychology, Psychology and Marketing, Journal of Retailing and Customer Services, or Tourism Perspectives. He has an extensive teaching experience in Hospitality Luxury Brand Management, Marketing, Advertising, and Marketing Research Methods. Florent has also worked as a Growth Driver at PriceWaterhouseCoopers.

Dr. Matthias Fuchs is an Assistant Professor of Marketing at EHL and serves as the Director of the Institute for Customer Experience Management. He researches digital customer behavior, product and service configurators, and customer feedback, and his work has been published in top-tier business journals such as the Journal of Marketing Research (ABS 4*, VHB A+, FT50) and the Journal of Business Ethics (FT50). He works closely with globally renown luxury brands (e.g., Audemars Piguet) and his work is featured in outlets like the New York Times, Neue Zürcher Zeitung, the Economic Times, and others. He is an experienced educator who teaches courses in marketing, brand management, customer experience, and computational thinking.

Prior to joining academia, Matthias spent over seven years in brand management and marketing management, holding various positions at Procter & Gamble and Coty Inc.