Business | Economy
Design your own $1m luxury Swiss timepiece
One of the world's most prestigious watchmakers has opened its workshop to the very rich, giving clients an opportunity to design their own one-of-a-kind watches worth as much as $1 million or more.
- Reuters
- Published: 00:00 April 10, 2007
Plan de Ouates, Switzerland: One of the world's most prestigious watchmakers has opened its workshop to the very rich, giving clients an opportunity to design their own one-of-a-kind watches worth as much as $1 million or more.
Juan-Carlos Torres, chief executive of Vacheron Constantin, said that fast economic growth in China, and resultant financial booms across the world, had vastly expanded the ranks of those who can afford luxury goods and put a premium on unique and hard-to-get items.
More than 30 customers have already conferred with Vacheron Constantin experts to personally select each element of their time pieces since the high-end brand owned by Riche-mont launched its special orders division in December.
Some have spent hundreds of thousands of francs and about 10 have asked for watches worth 2 million francs ($1.6 million) each of which can take years to be assembled, adjusted and adorned.
"It is not possible to get more exclusive than this," Torres said in an interview at Vacheron Constantin's manufacturing headquarters on the outskirts of Geneva.
The company produces 17,000 watches each year at its Swiss facilities, with about 100 watchmakers and artisans in white lab coats working with intricate components by hand. Some screws and other pieces are so tiny they are invisible to the naked eye.
Torres said while it may be tempting to ramp up production and increase turnover in the near-term, maintaining the value of the brand was critical to shield it from any future downturn in luxury goods, a notoriously cyclical sector.
"We could double our sales if we wanted to," he said, stressing that the company has resisted increasing its output to meet the recent spike in customer demand. "At no moment have we sacrificed the exclusivity of the brand for immediate profit."
Vacheron Constantin's watches range from around 10,000 francs for an athletic model to millions for the Kalla, made up of diamonds, whose price depends on the number of carats used. Popular designs such as the Malte and Patrimony sell for hundreds of thousands of francs.
Richemont's seven specialist watchmaking houses, which also include Piaget and Baume & Mercier, reported a combined 14 per cent rise in sales in the six months to the end of September 2006, the latest period for which results have been announced.
Vacheron Constantin's sales in the period were slightly higher than the same time in 2005, when it had a significant boost from its 250th anniversary products, Richemont said.
Complicated luxury
Torres said the company had to turn away dozens of potential buyers when it unveiled the world's most complicated wristwatch - the Tour de l'Ile - to mark its 250th anniversary in 2005.
It received some 50 order requests for the 2 million franc watch but made just seven of them in a limited-edition run.
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