The Frederique Constant
Classic Worldtimer
Manufacture, driven by
the FC-718 Manufacture
automatic caliber.
Bulova’s Oceanographer,
a limited edition from
the Archive Series.
Alpina’s Alpiner X smartwatch.
WITH REGARD TO THE OTHER CITIZEN GROUP BRANDS, CAN YOU OFFER
SOME INSIGHT AS TO HOW THEY MIGHT ACT AUTONOMOUSLY AS WELL
AS HOW THEY MIGHT BENEFIT AND CROSS-POLLINATE FROM BEING
PART OF CITIZEN? sales associate and ran some magazine ads and that was enough. Now, with
so much brand discovery and research done online, you need to feed the
online beast with product images, video and product knowledge. Instead of
fighting for case space we are now fighting for page space.
Within our company we speak of the Power of One. The power gained from
having all of our brands under one corporate umbrella. Our back-end
operations are led by a multi-brand leaders, and we streamline and
consolidate actions to be more efficient.
As you would expect, we benefit from our group status in all of our
marketing contracts and investments. We have in place Best Practice
Committees to oversee all of our business operations with representatives
from all the brands working together to find the best business practices to
follow. We keep our sales teams separate, but we do cross-pollinate some of
our most senior executives in marketing and creative services. WITH REGARD TO RETAIL STRATEGY, WHAT PERCENTAGE DO YOU SEE AS
THE RIGHT BALANCE BETWEEN THE TRADITIONAL AND DIRECT ON-LINE
SALES, AND WHEN DO YOU THINK THE INDUSTRY MIGHT REACH A
SOMEWHAT STABILIZED EXPRESSION OF THESE METHODS?
WHAT ARE THE BIGGEST CHALLENGES THAT THE BRANDS IN THE CITIZEN
GROUP MAY FACE IN THE YEARS AHEAD?
The biggest challenges we face are the changes in retail and consumer
behavior. The watch and jewelry business models were built and grew in the
U.S. market through mall expansion. We see now that model is no longer
viable. Already some changes have happened, but more will follow, and how
we pivot and adjust to these changes will be our greatest challenge.
It used to be you placed your product on a display in a store, trained the
42 | INTERNATIONAL WATCH | WINTER 2020
Pundits once thought that luxury items like watches and jewelry would
be immune from online sales, but what we see now is that consumers want
options. I believe twenty percent of all sales will be executed online.
ANY INSIGHTS OR TEASES FOR OUR READERS AND FOLLOWERS THAT
YOU CAN OFFER FROM ANY OR ALL OF YOUR BRANDS?
We will continue to see introductions in our Promaster Collection from
Citizen, and we have been very successful in Bulova over the years with
our Archive Series.
You can expect to see some new models that pay homage to our
history. Alpina will also introduce some new models inspired by the
brand’s rich Swiss history as the first Swiss sports watch. Frederique
Constant will continue to bring in new models using in-house Manufacture
movements.