How was the year 2015 for Longines?
In terms of sales it was flat. We cannot expect the same growth rates that we had before.
In 2015 the loss we suffered in Hong Kong was to some extent compensated for by Japan and Thailand, as well as in Europe before the problems towards the end of the year.
And for this year?
Well it’s only March so we cannot really say. We could do a lot better but the penalty we are suffering from Hong Kong is enormous. It’s our second biggest market. We managed to remain fairly stable in China, however, because our segment has not been affected by the anti-corruption measures of the government. We are distributed in a chain of some 250 stores in China that has 40 different brands. We get their sales figures every week and I can see that Longines is still a very strong brand there. If anything, we may even have benefited from the anti-corruption measures as people buy watches more for themselves.
You often travel to Asia. Do you see any prospects for improvement in the region?
Not in Hong Kong. I was there last month and you can clearly see the effects of the reduction in visa allocations for groups. In Europe there is the aftermath of the Paris attacks and the negative impact of the new requirement for biometric passports, which is also affecting the numbers of Chinese tourists.
Longines has always been competitive in its price segment. But is competition in your core range increasing for you?
Our core range is between 1,500 and 3,000 Swiss francs and we dominate in this segment.
What about the talk of crisis and smartwatches? Are they both a temporary phenomenon?
We’ll see! The sales volumes of the Apple and Samsung smart watches have not even reached the levels that the brands themselves expected. Of course, in terms of units these volumes are huge and I do see people wearing these watches, maybe less in Europe but more in the USA and Asia. But not at the level I expected. I think it’s a field for Apple and Samsung but not for Swiss watchmakers. The Swiss brands that have entered this market are courageous and I respect them, but let’s see how things look in two years’ time. I’ve always said that if it encourages people to wear a watch, they may turn to analogue watches later, for example when they are fed up of the technology and obsolescence, so that’s a good thing.
Is it the year of the lady at Longines?
Contrary to what people believe, we have been generating over 50% of our sales from ladies’ watches for some time now. There are different reasons for this. Firstly, we started doing pair watches very early. It started back in 1974 when we set up the Longines subsidiary in Japan. We also benefited from our confidence in the ETA 2000 calibre, which we have since adapted as our own exclusive calibre. It has allowed us to offer ladies’ mechanical watches as small as 25mm in diameter. This is an area where we are very strong.
In our communications, at least 50% of our advertising is targeted at ladies and we have always had very strong female ambassadors like Kate Winslet, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Chi Ling Lin, Ingeborga Dapkunaite, not forgetting our historical ambassador Steffi Graf, of course. Before that we were even pushing Audrey Hepburn in our advertising campaigns. This is always backed up with the corresponding products, of course.
