New Frontiers
Jean-marc Pontroué of Panerai discusses how innovation at the brand isn’t solely concerned with technology
Panerai has been on a roll with Jean-marc Pontroué at its helm. The brand’s recent releases have been among its most cohesive yet, speaking a design and technical language that balances heritage with integrating innovations that offer tangible benefits for the wearer.
Panerai has also offered special models in limited runs, with each watch granting its owner access to an exclusive experience that’s curated by the brand. These are exciting times for the brand, which look set to bring even more fans into the fiercely loyal paneristi community.
Panerai has, in the last two years, offered its clients various exclusive experiences when they purchase certain limited-edition timepieces. How did this come about?
The idea behind these experiences is to offer something different for clients who already have a strong connection to us. They’ve probably visited our flagship stores and our museum, or have done other similar things, so what else can we offer to help them understand us even better?
The answer is to offer experiences that you don’t normally have access to, with ambassadors who have expertise in their respective areas, while keeping the focus on the timepieces themselves. We want to put participants through some tough activities so they can see how the Panerai watches they’re wearing can withstand these environments.
We’ve staged two of these experiences, each with about 60 to 70 guests. One was with the Italian Navy in Italy, and the other was with free-diver Guillaume Néry in Tahiti. We could have offered the same experiences to 500 people, but driving sales was never the priority here. Instead, we want our guests to have fun, and to return safely from these adventures. Keeping the groups small also lets us have closer interactions with our clients.
I’m sure these are also perfect opportunities for you to really get to know your customers on a personal level.
The beauty of Panerai is that it’s a brand of communities. When you put together 50 people who love Panerai, you start to create networks and relationships. Some people who attended the experiences started off as strangers, but are now in touch for personal or business reasons. Our concept offers a powerful way to build connections. It’s definitely worked for us as well, or we wouldn’t be planning seven new experiences for 2021.
What about clients who haven’t worked their way up to become VIPS yet and who may not have access to these limited-edition watches?
We actually hosted mixes of established customers who’ve been with us for a long time, and new ones who’ve just started out.
Each country has its own allocation of these watches and experiences, and it’s not only the VIPS who experience them. Of course, the customers who’ve already joined us want more, and when they share their experiences, their friends end up applying as well. We probably have the capacity to do 10 such experiences a year, so availability isn’t a huge issue.
This entire concept of offering experiences seems almost like an experiment that’s turned out well for the brand.
We’re trying to be loyal to our claim of being the laboratorio di idee, or the “laboratory of ideas”. It’s a concept that extends to our work elsewhere, from developing and working with new materials, to movement research and development, to production processes, and more.
We also try to reinvent ourselves regularly so that our products remain as desirable as possible. In our laboratory now, for example, we have maybe 10 new materials that are undergoing testing. Even if we have a success rate of just 10 percent, we’ll already have something entirely new to offer.