Ebel - Marc Michel-Amadry
GMT - Spring - summer 2009
How does your co-presidency of Ebel with Loek Oprinsen actually work?
Loek Oprinsen was the Ebel Director for Northern Europe and has now become Marketing Director and President. I was Marketing Director and also responsible for product development, which is entirely in line with my new functions as President and Design Director. We both report directly to Efraim Grinberg, CEO of the Movado group. This twin presidency reflects a new manner of representing a brand today. It is at the opposite end of the spectrum from some brands that have tended to foster oversized egos. These days, a leadership role calls for more humility in performing the task in hand. Loek and I are serving a brand and a team. We know each other well, we share information almost in real time and we challenge each other mutually, which helps us to take better decisions.
What does your involvement in football bring to the brand?
We are already partnering AFC Ajax, Arsenal, Bayern Munich, Olympic Lyonnais, the Rangers of Scotland and Real Madrid, and three other clubs have made requests for a similar commitment. Each of them offers us huge commercial opportunities, not only in their own country, but also around the world through their other partners or fan clubs. For example, a Dubai-based Real Madrid fan ordered 20 watches for his friends one week after we announced the creation of this limited series. Bayern Munich has bought 50 watches from the first limited series and we are launching the second one this autumn. Even though we never place the club logos on the models dedicated to them, but only distinctive emblems, their sales represent half of the turnover for our men's lines. In terms of creativity, the Tekton watches also enable us to innovate in new fields: the next Tekton Real Madrid will become the first bezel-free watch, featuring joints hidden beneath the watch glass and an anodised aluminium outer dial ring.
How are the ladies' models developing?
They still account for two-thirds of our sales, and we would ideally like to achieve a 40/60% balance between men's and women's watches. We are seeing a rise in demand for self-winding models, especially among smaller watches. We are in an excellent position in this segment, where several major brands have increased their prices, in particular with a gold and steel Classic Lady Automatic that retails at CHF 3900. At Baselworld, we will be introducing extensions of the existing lines and reserving our new launches for the second half of the year. Generally speaking, we want our new products to fit smoothly into existing collections and to provide genuine substance. Nobody can really gauge retailers' capacity to absorb new products this year, which also explains why we will present only 17 new references this year (including both men's and ladies' models), compared with 30 last year.
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