Stephane Waser tells BW Retail World that the brand is looking at exponential growth and doubling the volumes over the two to three years
Emphasising that access to luxury goods has increased significantly and increase in disposable income will fuel the consumption going ahead, Stephane Waser, Managing Director of Maurice Lacroix, noted that India is on track to rank among the top five markets for the brand over the next two to three years.
In an interview with BW Retail World, the MD of the Swiss luxury watchmaker highlighted that the brand is looking at exponential growth and doubling the volumes over the two to three years. As the brand completes 50 years, Waser added that it now sells in 65 markets worldwide. Edited Excerpts:
Since the Swiss watch exports to India are constantly growing, how does the company see India as part of its global strategy going ahead?
We are now part of Ethos since 2019. We have been looking at India certainly for the last 20 years. When we entered into 2019, it was just before Covid. We started with 12 point of sales, then moved to 18. Today, we are at 45 point of sales with ethos. We have growth rates year on year. We sell in 65 markets and India now is in the top ten. If we continue to grow like this consistently on the next two to three years, India will be in our top five.
While the brand enjoys healthy growth in the urban centre, are there any plans to penetrate deeper into the emerging non-metro cities?
Yeah, we work as a partnership with Ethos and the retail strategy and expansion depends on what they will take forward. But we have discussed and they will start going to second and third tier cities now. We will also be part of that expansion.
Which price bands are saying the highest growth in the country as compared to the other markets?
What you have is a 20 per cent import tariff, then you have the goods and services tax (GST). On an average, prices in India are 20 to 30 per cent more expensive than abroad. That is a big challenge for local operators because they import from Switzerland, and it is in Swiss francs.
So, if they want to stay competitive, it is mostly at their own expense. Now, the free trade agreement is really a good thing because they are going to progressively lift these tariffs. India is already very dynamic today, but it will become even more competitive.
Are there plans for brand-owned boutiques or flagship stores in India, or experiential retail formats to deepen brand connection?
Currently, we are present in like 1,400 to 1,500 stores worldwide. We have only three mono-brands. It is KL, Bangkok and Zurich. Zurich is a home market and if you are a serious brand, you have to have a boutique there on the Bahnhofstrasse.
For the other markets, it is more linked to local specificities, opportunities. There is no real strategy in terms of opening mono-brand boutiques. But if things go well in India and if the Ethos as a partner think that it is a good business plan, we can do something out of it.
What growth in revenue are you targeting for Maurice Lacroix in India over the next three to five years?
We do not really communicate on numbers, but what we want to see is we have a very nice growth. We are doing a certain number of watches and we have tripled the watch volume we were doing three years ago. We are looking forward to at least double this over the next two, three years. It is going to be quite exponential.
Indian watch buyers seem to be moving from seeing watches purely as functional items to lifestyle / fashion statements. How do you see this shift and how are you leveraging it?
I have seen it now these days. When I first came to India 13 years ago, there was just one luxury mall. You could not see that luxury consumption, unless you were quite wealthy and you were traveling and buying abroad, fashion brands and luxury brands, there was not much of that. These days, I was in the malls, you have all the premium brands and they are very busy as people are buying. There is an access to luxury goods, which is much higher than it was before.
This has accelerated already, but it will continue because of younger generation, higher disposable income and so on. 10 to 15 years ago, we did not have social media as much as we have it today. Communication, digital also contributes a lot to people in India. Today, you can know what is hot and what is trendy on the other side of the world with your phone. That also contributes a lot.
