How do you attract millennial customers?
We are in a world that is going so fast. There is something new in every
aspect of our lives today. Millennials were born in this society, which is
very different from ours, and they want a product that is contemporary,
but is also linked to the past, which is not easy as an exercise.
That is what we’re trying to do at Zenith. Take the El Primero, with 150
years of tradition, but we don’t want to just repeat the past. We reinvent it.
And price is important. For the Millennials, luxury has a different
meaning. They will not pay any price just for the status. They will buy
luxury because they feel there is real value in what they’re buying. In our
industry in the past few years, the prices went through the roof, partly
due to what I would call the Chinese bubble.
The Chinese were buying so much at any price basically, and many
brands lost their local fans – clients couldn’t see the link between the
A new Zenith Pilot Cronometro Tipo Cp-2
product and the price. At Zenith, we did not enjoy this Chinese bubble,
so that’s maybe why we did not increase the price as much as some
other brands.
The Millenials want things real in the world, and I think if we can show
them this is the right price, we can capture them. We are a full manufacture,
and we start at $5,000, and we go to $10,000. That’s our core business. It’s
money, it’s not nothing, but it’s not crazy money.
I don’t know anyone making watches in-house who is selling for those
prices. They are selling at twice or three times the price.
The 26-month downturn in Swiss exports affected the
industry in many ways. Do you think slower growth
is the new normal?
The best years are probably behind us, but were they really the best years or
were they a bit artificial, inflated with the Chinese boom? Now I think we’re
back to normal. I don’t think the boom we knew will come back, but still, the
industry is in good health when you think about it, compared to so many
industries that are struggling. We should not complain.
I think the U.S. is still a great potential market. I was living there in 2004
and I thought, wow, there are so many millionaires and billionaires here. The
highest concentration is in New York. Yet I remember meeting so many people
who didn’t realize they could buy expensive watches. That’s improving. People
are realizing that having nice watches is part of the equipment. Also, finally
more and more people under 40 are not incorrectly thinking that Zenith is
the name of a brand of television.
122 | INTERNATIONAL WATCH | SPRING 2018