AWJ met with Nicola Andreatta, CEO of Roger Dubuis during his recent visit to Dubai
Roger Dubuis is one of the most exclusive luxury watch brands in the world today, and in keeping with the times they are transforming themselves to more exclusive and contemporary but without compromising on their uniqueness and genuine value.
AWJ met with Nicola Andreatta, CEO of Roger Dubuis during his recent visit to Dubai and hereafter are the excerpts from the interview.
Recently, Roger Dubuis announced the new Hyper Horology to be a disruptive approach. One direction was towards a new association with Urban Art Tribe and Gally Grafiti Dr woo Tatoo Artisit. Can you shed some light on this new direction for the brand?
You mentioned Hyper Horology. Hyper is a word that is being used more and more, I would say, in the last thirty years. It comes from the Greek language and signifies going beyond. So the idea is to evolve watchmaking in a direction that has never been done before. Now, watchmaking is also a way to reflect the culture, it is more like an object that talks about who we are. We have been pushing a lot into one territory of expression for the brand which was the motorsport world through partnership with Lamborghini and Pirelli which are all about strong emotion, adrenalin, extreme and all that. We feel it is a moment for us to concentrate on the expressivity of the brand. For us, hyper horology means a contemporary and expressive approach to find all and more about watchmaking. So going beyond into this direction there is no better place, there is no better thing, to express a different perspective, different vision about the world than contemporary art. We have been selecting some artists who are raised well within the DNA of the brand, with what the brand stands for. You know the word excess, also pleasure and freedom as the key words for Roger Dubuis and the artists we selected are very much into the same direction. We decided to explore the perception of the reality, the world of Roger Dubuis through the eyes of some contemporary artists. It was the beginning of a journey and now we are creating as we speak, in the sense that it is a creative connection with them and very soon will come with some products which are co-created or built together.
Roger Dubuis’ new approach towards special display of its dials was obvious via the Excalibur Glow-me-up. How was this approach received in the market and among RD lovers?
Once again, for us this approach also means trying out daringly different ideas. My going to some of our colleagues playing with the lights would seem a bit crazy but we are expressive and innovative. We wanted to play with the quality of a timepiece that during the day seems absolutely classic, very refined, but during the night comes up with a crazy and completely different idea. We have been researching quite a lot, playing with luminous materials for almost two years now and the combination of the experience we have accrued with these kinds of ideas led us to this concept. I think all jewellery brands can play with that idea and it would be simply mindboggling. We decided to keep it very limited and made only 8 pieces as a limited edition for specific clients we knew would appreciate it. That it was sold out within less than a week shows it was well appreciated. We brought this innovation to the marketplace and are trying to patent the concept because we see a lot of potential opportunity in the future for us to play with.
The skeletonized approach is a key one for us because it is really the only way for us to show the way we craft our timepieces. It is not only what we do but how we do it that is important, and the fact that we are going back to a more Geneva-sealed finish by hand shows how we care for the way we do things. Moving to another level you now have a beautiful finish skeletonized caliber which is a single flying tourbillon with that angle. This creative approach makes it evident, as we always say, that you can expect the unexpected from Roger Dubuis. This is exactly what you get, a watch set with baguette that at night glows up with another combination of colors nobody will expect. That is where we come out head and shoulders above the rest.
Do we expect more releases from Roger Dubuis during the course of the year?
Clearly we are working very close with Lamborghini and Pirelli, so in the motorsport world we are working on a few novelties that will be rolling out in the next few months. Lamborghini is very prolific in the launch of a new car and potentially we will associate again the name of Roger Dubuis with that Lamborghini special edition. There are few other, let me say, tactical operations that we are doing till the end of the year. We started the journey of the Excalibur regional face lift with the double tourbillon and the single tourbillon and there will be more in this direction.
How important it is for a luxury brand to be engaged in sustainability? How do you value the new Blockchain trend especially that some of the Richemont’s “Classic” brands are heavily investing in this high technology?
We are definitely open to new things and this is once again one of the key things at Roger Dubuis. We have been exploring few possibilities with the blockchain and Group Richemont itself is working with few partners. What is important is that you move toward the future by choosing the right technology and this is probably the moment where a few things are moving forward. At the same time and you need to make sure you choose the right horse to take you there. So we are still exploring possibilities with blockchain, to cite one example. We started working for blockchain for IP protection which is one of the significant areas in business. We are working to understand how we can manage the certificate of authenticity, the history of our watches and so on and there is more to come in the future.
Sustainability, as we just discussed the couple of hours ago, is a strategic move for Roger Dubuis, not because there is a commercial side on everything but it is really the substantial side. I think we need to be responsible in the way we do business and because we receive a lot the more we give back in another way the better. It is a responsibility we owe to ourselves, to the new generation and at Roger Dubuis the investment we are going to put in sustainability is a key one. We have five different ideas that we been working over the past few months which will potentially talk about our commitment very soon though I’m not into revealing them now.
Where would be the next big expansion plan for the brand? Staying in the skeleton movement or expand your collection towards other designs, movements or further expansion of the Velvet collection?
The expansion plan for Roger Dubuis doesn’t necessarily mean that we need to go into new things. I think we need to make sure that we do well on what we do and for me it is more about consolidating because I always say I don’t want to increase quantities. For me it is absolutely essential to remain very exclusive because there is no way we can go into quantities ourselves. Recent strategic decision was that of killing our plain dials so the entry level is the Huracan collection which is a skeletonized one. That is because we need to choose our battle style. We cannot do everything, forget about doing well, and so we have to really focus on what we do best where we can ensure the value of our doing and it is going to be skeletonized watches.
Now I talked about consolidation because for us there are some markets which are doing very well and there are some others where we still have to work a little more. That is going to be behind our expansion plan making sure we connect more with local communities, we build that kind of relations. We like to talk about Roger Dubuis more than selling the watches, we sell and connect the brand with our clients. Ours has to be a magnificent, beautiful world where people when they come can have fun and the watches are just going to be the sign of belonging to a certain type of world.
We have witnessed a new genderless trend in the market. Roger Dubuis appears as a very masculine brand. Isn’t this too segmenting for your development?
Well it is a very good point and indeed in the past we had been keen towards men. It has been there, it is there, it is still representing part of our business even without pushing or communicating about it. We know that some ladies when they come to Roger Dubuis like the Velvet collection, and most of the time even when someone buys a watch for himself he buys the Velvet too for his partner. I came up with a genderless approach right at the beginning of my experience at Roger Dubuis. I think that we were oriented towards men because our universe of expression was motorsport and so talking mostly to men.
Times are changing and we are less into motorsport, and now more talking of contemporary art. We now have two completely different territories of expression, one speaking to men and the other more universal. I always mention about this incredible lady, Vietnamese but living in Australia. She is the head of Lamborghini Club in Sydney. Last year she bought a violet Aventador for herself and she got a double tourbillon with a violet strap and violet stones matching the car, a 47mm double flying tourbillon. You see more and more ladies are interested in motorsport and in complications. Now complications cannot fit on 34mm case, it is impossible so it is revolving. As I said we are less into motorsport or at least also into other universal segments. We are playing with smaller sizes so I see more possibilities to connect to a new public. If someone wants to wear these, they should choose the watch that would fit the wrist better without bothering if they are for men or women. It has to be a brand approach and we are liberating the market from saying in advance what should be or should not be. I think it is fully reflected in what we see today. Asian men like diamond watches and American men maybe wouldn’t ever think of wearing a diamond watch.
Second hand, re-sale, auction is a big topic among your targeted audience. How do you ensure your watches keep their values?
Firstly, I agree with you. If we look at two or three years ago you will see more and more Roger Dubuis and specially the early days of Roger Dubuis are very different from what it is today. It shows that when you start anything new you cannot erase the past. This world is regulated by demand and there are too many things around on offer. My answer to what you asked is that, by continuing to keep Roger Dubuis exclusive and continuously innovating with products that will not be available to everybody, I believe we will sustain a different level of value. Now I also have to say that a lot of people have wrong perceptions about the brand. Recently I invited a couple of big names in the watchmaking and collectors world to come to Geneva because I had seen a couple of interviews where they talked about competitors and they knew what we do. These very well respected people in the industry came back after two hours manufacture tour and told me that they never knew we were so exclusive. They were always thinking we make over 30,000 watches a year and didn’t know the level of the brand quality, and thought that the Geneva-sealed was just a claim. Now they saw the reality and changed their opinion.
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