Lovisa CEO makes more than Woolworths, Coles and Qantas bosses

The boss of a budget jewellery retailer has made more than the CEOs at some of Australia’s biggest companies like Woolworths, Coles and Qantas.

The boss of a budget jewellery retailer has quietly raked in a staggering pay packet, trumping the remuneration of CEOs at the likes of some of Australia’s biggest companies, including Woolworths, Coles and Qantas.

Victor Herrero is the CEO of jewellery chain Lovisa and now also the best-paid chief executive on the ASX after bringing home an eye-watering $29 million in the financial year just gone.

In total, for the 2023 financial year, Mr Herrero made $29.09m from a combination of cash, shares and options in the company.

Mr Herrero made $1.9m as direct money from his salary but then he received an additional $2.05m as a bonus and a further $24.975m from options in Lovisa.

That’s up from his already handsome pay packet for the previous period, where he made $21 million.

For an idea of how much money that is for a company like Lovisa, his full pay packet was nearly half of the company’s total profit for the year.

And for some comparison, Wesfarmers’ CEO Rob Scott made $8.175 in the same period of time. That’s despite Wesfarmers being 30 times bigger than Lovisa as a company.

Alan Joyce, the outgoing boss of Qantas, is expected to receive a golden handshake payout of $24 million.

Woolworths boss Brad Banducci reportedly received $11.7 million while Coles chief executive Leah Weckert got $3.30 million as she was only appointed to the role in May.

Mr Herrero’s pay also comes amid a scandal involving workers’ pay at Lovisa.

Victor Herrero, Lovisa's chief executive.

Lovisa has announced its annual results. Picture: Brenda Strong / The Observer

Lovisa is a large jewellery chain that markets affordable accessories which was founded in Australia in 2010.

At time of writing, the business has a market capitalisation of $2.22 billion.

It has since boomed to over 400 stores worldwide, including Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia, Singapore, South Africa, Spain, France and the US.

Mr Herrero has only been Lovisa’s CEO for two years, after he replaced outgoing chief executive officer Shane Fallscheer, who had worked in that role for 12 years.

Previously, Mr Herrero worked at the Inditex Group, the owner of Zara, Pull & Bear and Massimo Dutti, for 13 years.

Mr Herrero also spent four years in California as CEO of Guess brand and also acted as the CEO of international shoe brand Clarks.

He is Spanish and was living in Singapore prior to his appointment at Lovisa.

Lovisa is a budget jeweller.

Last year, Mr Herrero’s almost as massive annual payout sparked outrage off the back of wage theft allegations and a law firm beginning a class action against the company.

In December 2022, national law firm Adero, which specialises in employment law class actions, announced it was looking into the jewellery chain Lovisa over a potential breach of its enterprise agreement.

Adero’s website says it is aware of claims that Lovisa staff had been directed to skip meal and toilet breaks, undertake unpaid overtime and work additional hours during Christmas sales periods without appropriate overtime rates.