Supply and Demand

Meeting ‘Indonesia Tatler’ amid his busy schedule, François-henry Bennahmias, CEO of Audemars Piguet, explains the Swissbased luxury watchmaker’s philosophy of ‘fewer, bigger and better’ 106

s ceo of Audemars Piguet, FrançoisHenry Bennahmias continues to develop strategies that both surprise and delight markets and buyers everywhere and which keep this historic brand growing and innovating. He was once an avid golfer, ranking number 25 in France; now Bennahmias has developed a bold drive for excellence in challenges and adventures that befits a high-quality, luxury watchmaker. What are your overall plans for the company during the rest of 2016? Overall, we are keeping the momentum going. This year started great, and although the watch industry is slowing down, our first quarter saw growth of 15 per cent: better than last year’s fourth quarter. We do believe that the brand is in great shape and more new clients are coming in, so we have a lot to do.

Regarding Indonesia, I just had a talk with the team about what the market would need and the allocation. As a result, we are going to reallocate sales from another country to Indonesia, and when [the management team] leaves the country today, the question is how to explore this country’s qualitative potential.

One of your mottos is “fewer, bigger and better”. Could you elaborate on its implementation in the company’s future plans? Basically, we know that today we produce some 40,000 watches and we’re going to keep producing 40,000 for the next five years, no matter what. But we want to increase the actual demand to 45,000 or 50,000 pieces and yet still make 40,000. So, our goals are building the brand equity, perceived value and really sell the watches where they make the most sense. If business in a country goes down, we can take the watches away to dry out the market a little bit and move them to a market that’s booming—such as Indonesia. That’s a qualitative example of “fewer, bigger and better”.

How’s progress in creating the upcoming new classical line and chronograph movement, as mentioned during SIHH 2016? It’s done, but it’s going to come during SIHH 2018. Why? There are specific reasons for that, which include making our buyers wait in anticipation. And the new chronograph will also be there.