Our ties with dealers give us the edge over big-group brands: Elie Bernheim

Interview with Director, Raymond Weil

Technopak Advisors puts the luxury watch segment at about Rs 900 crore, selling 210,000 pieces and growing at 15-20 per cent. Raymond Weil the Swiss watchmaker brand headed by the third generation of the owner-founder was an early entrants. With watches from Rs 45,000 to over Rs 2 lakh, it is competitively priced against players like Omega and Tag Heuer. Yet, marketing to Indian consumers is not a cakewalk, Elie Bernheim, its director, tells Sayantani Kar. Edited excerpts:

You started with your own stores in 2010. How has distribution expanded since then?

In the two years since launching our 100 per cent subsidiary in India, we have opened six boutiques. However, my maternal grandfather (Raymond Weil) was one of the earliest to enter India to tap the luxury space, way back in 1982. His early visits to the country ensured that the brand is rooted with the luxury watch retailers in the country in a way that few other brands can boast of. In all, we have around 60 points-of-sale in the country including shops-in-shop.

My visit is to ensure that we reinforce this distribution. It is also to mark the launch of some novel models unveiled at the last Basel fair such as the Jasmine collection and the refreshed Freelancer chronograph.

Have you started introducing collections according to insights from India?

The Jasmine is a 100-per-cent ladies' collection. The watches are a dainty 35mm, have diamond encrusted bezels that are preferred by Indian women, for example. We are also bringing in the Maestro which a fully-automatic series.

We bring all of our collections to India. There are seven as of now, out of which the top five contribute over 90 per cent to our revenue. We have also brought in the Nabucco collection priced from Rs 2 lakh.

So, are you moving up the value chain?

As a small entrepreneurial company, every exercise of ours has to be positive on the bottomline. We are happy with out price positioning, so this would be a one-off line and we won't move up. Profitability has been difficult in India but we are working on it.

Is it difficult to market luxury watches to the Indian consumer?

Every market is different. Marketing to Indian consumers is not easy. We have to talk to them, furnish a lot of information about the product. But there is a bank of knowledge that my grandfather and father gathered on their visits to reach out to consumers.

Our relationship with luxury watch dealers over the years have established a comfortable partnership as well. We have weekly interactions with each of them, helping the cause of marketing further.

The time our brand has spent in the country has also resulted in an older generation passing down their watches to the current one and hence, there is also a ready audience to begin with.

How have you tailored your marketing?

Our regular interactions with our retailers, for example, protect us from the pressures in multi-brand retail. Given we are one of the last Swiss family-owned watch companies, maintaining a closer connect with our retail partners in India is easier than that for brands belonging to big groups. These brands are known to put pressure for display space and margins on retailers because of the groups' business objectives. While we are also competitive, our regular human contact with dealers is proving to be very helpful.

We have also developed our India Facebook page. By the end of next year, we will dedicate 30 per cent of our marketing budget because this channel is relevant to us.

Established in 1976, what is your modern-day differentiator?

We offer refined timepieces at an affordable price. So, we try to keep our marketing in line with our image and not convey a over-blown sense of prestige. We are clear about pursuing new skews in our kind of watches, develop complications with our movement suppliers (such as ETA SA) with whom we partner.