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- [00:00]
A
Foreign.
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B
Watch fans, welcome to another edition of the Real Time show with me, your friendly neighborhood jeweler, Alamo Joseph. Today, one of the most humble, friendly CEOs in the watch business. Welcome to the studio. Michel Nidegger.
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A
Oh, my God, what an introduction. Thank you for. Thank you for having me. For the record, I only pretend to be humble. I'm actually very arrogant. So, you know, just putting that out there.
- [00:33]
B
I said friendly and funny as well. Michel, you've been running the show at Greb en Forsey for a year plus right now. I had the honor to meet you almost incognito once when I came to a press meeting. And I've said this on air before, that I was blown away. Have never met somebody on the press and marketing side of things in the watch industry that knew so much and was so passionate. So it doesn't surprise me a little bit that you are now running the show there. So last time we had you on the show, Michel, was during Geneva Watch Days September last year.
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A
That's right. That's right.
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B
I just want to touch upon very quickly how has been the end of 25 and the beginning of 26 for Grobo and Forsey up until now.
- [01:21]
A
It's been super exciting, actually. And it's getting more and more exciting by the day. We can really, I guess especially now, we can feel how different it is to work as a completely independent brand. And you know, even when we, when we are thinking about hiring some new additions to our staff, which we kind of desperately need, you know, if we, if we put out a job description today, three months from now, it will be completely different than it is today. So we're, you know, we're very excited been. We've been busier than. Busier than usual, I would say. And we're already looking forward to 2027, 2028. So we're having a fantastic time.
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B
Will we encounter you at Geneva watch days 26 coming September?
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A
Of course. Yeah. We'll be at the, at the Beau Rivage for watches and wonders. We usually do La Reserve because it's closer to Palexpo, but for Geneva Watch Days will be right in the center.
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B
Amazing. So I wanted to speak to you actually before Geneva Watches because most likely we will sit down there as well. But I got very excited when in April, you guys announced the two final editions of the Balancier convex S quadrant. If I remember correctly, you launched a black ceramic in 5N red gold, plus a white ceramic one. Correct. Marking the end of the caliber which you've Developed over five years. So when did you decide to close the chapter? Was ceramic always the material you wanted to end on, or how did you land on that decision?
- [03:01]
A
So I guess for us, when we launched the piece in 2021, we had said that we're going to build it for five years and five years only. So it was important for us to actually stand by what we said back then. And we figured it did deserve a special edition to close this chapter. And we had never done either white or black ceramic before, and we figured that this caliber would be perfectly suited for something like this. And we also wanted to have a nice challenge for us as well, and to have something which is surprising and a little bit different from what we had been doing in the past. So in closing the calibre, that's also, for us, a nice motivation to. To move on to other projects. So now, moving forward, we're looking at four entirely new movements between end of 26 and then going into 2027. And that's kind of the approach. So the S2, we closed the movement there. The tourbillon 24 second architecture as well. And so in closing certain calibers, it gives us time to focus on new ones, which has always been, you know, what Robert and Steven, our founders, really enjoyed the most. And now we're 35 calibers in so far, which is, you know, a pretty insane amount. But that's really what we're most passionate about. And we want to put most of our focus and energy.
- [04:33]
B
And it's a rather exclusive end two way. A beautiful chapter because I believe it's twice 11.
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A
Yeah, exactly.
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B
So why 11? Does it have any significance? Significance for.
- [04:44]
A
Oh, yes. It's a kind of internal tradition where, you know, Robert is one person, Stephen is one, and then you put the two together and you get 11. And so our limitations are usually multiples of 11. So 22, 33, something like that.
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B
And today we have a huge palette of ceramic colors. Why did you opt for black and white? Is yin yang an inspiration? Did you?
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A
Well, we didn't think of that. We should have, now that you mentioned it.
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B
No.
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A
We're not really used to. We're not known for being super experimental in terms of case materials. And we usually have a very traditional approach to watchmaking. So it's 500 gold, platinum, a lot of titanium. And it's not something, which is part of our expertise per se, to offer very funky colors because we want our timepieces to be kind of relevant in the future just as much as they are now. And with black and white, I think that's as elegant and as pure as we could have gone. And so we did.
- [05:53]
B
Did you bundle them? I assume there's some collectors that won both. Did you bundle the limited edition numbers?
- [06:01]
A
We presented them at the same time, but actually no, I don't think that someone wanted both. If I remember correctly, it was really either or. So some were really crazy about the white ceram, but not at all the black, but which was kind of the idea to have an interesting offering for that as well.
- [06:22]
B
Economically, it's a huge investment to make a caliber. A five year return on investment is not that long in the watch business. And you do make your life easy because you've started off at 43 and a half millimeters in 21 and then two years down the line you shrink it. What was the reasoning behind that and how was that received by collectors?
- [06:48]
A
So in terms of offering two different sizes, it was the first time that we experimented a little bit on that. Now in hindsight, moving forward, it will be much better for us to offer a smaller size from the beginning because in building movements there's really no line to be drawn between the movement and the case. So it was quite challenging to slim it down substantially, but the feedback was very positive and we saw that in our offering. That's one of the last sort of missing elements that we haven't explored, I guess to its full potential in the past. So now a few weeks ago we came out with the balance EQM, which is a 39.6 millimeter. And when I mentioned the four calibers to be rolled out from end of 26 into 27, so there three of them are all below 40 mm. So it's something which for us, the interest for us is really to preserve that three dimensional movement architecture and that that depth that we're known for, but to do it in a smaller diameter. So that's really the, the challenge that we, that we set ourselves. And it's not that we want to do only small pieces, of course, but we figured, you know, it would be nice to have an offering, a strong offering as well in smaller diameters. And so the S2, to reply to your question, that was the first time that we kind of ventured into seeing what the response would be. And I think everyone was very pleased that we did. And so it's something that we want
- [08:27]
B
to continue to work on besides aesthetics and literally dimensions. The Balance Convex S2 was a distilled expression of the brand's values, but also a relative entry point to the brand for collectors. How will you progress from here from that perspective, entry point wise to the brand in the roadmap ahead? Sure.
- [08:58]
A
I guess in the way that we work when we start a new project, we don't necessarily define, you know, price, segment or quantity or markets. It's basically, you know, trying to solve a problem in watchmaking or try to learn something or try to explore different territories. And then the, I guess the retail price is a consequence of our development cost. So you know, for a grandsonnery which, which took us 11 years to develop, it was not, you know, we want to have a grandsonre at this price point. It was just a natural consequence. And it's kind of like that for for most of everything that we do. That said, we do want to offer an interesting range with an entry level today being at 175 which is as low as we've been able to come until now and then of course up to a million 250 for the grandsonry. So we do have a project that we're hoping to, to complete. We're not quite sure yet, but maybe for 2027 we might be looking at an entry level at 120, which for us would be very new and very interesting. But then what we're seeing is that the number of pieces we could do per year has to be quite low because it's very challenging for us to make no compromises on quality and to still be able to offer something an entry level like that is. Is quite difficult. So we'll see. But it's something that we're working on hard and we hope we can, you know, we hope it works out.
- [10:40]
B
We spoke about the time it takes to develop a caliber brands need to bring back their initial investment. So the movement the GF09XV with 301 components of which 68 escapement platform with a 30 degrees inclined balance wheel system driven by two fast rotating coaxial barrels and then completing a rotation in 3.2 hours is understatement. New, not done before. Which a lot of stuff that you do is new, retiring. Sounds a pity, but I always see the glass half full. What technical lessons did you, as a group of magnificent engineers or watchmakers, draw from this carrying forward into your future work?
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A
So maybe to answer a question that you haven't asked in terms of return on investment, honestly, it's not really something that we care about that much. And I would say there's, you know, been quite a few more examples which are much more extreme. What comes to mind is the double Balance ewt, which was the very first sort of iteration of the double balance system of which we've made a total of six pieces. So that, you know, when you talk about return on investment for something like this, that's, that's on a completely different level as well. I would say the art pieces are similar in that way. So I would say the S2 was actually fairly reasonable and we were able to produce for five years. So that's. You know, again, there's more extreme examples than this in terms of the lessons that we've learned. It's that our in house balance wheel, the 12.6 millimeter balance wheel inclined has great performance. So that's something that we want to maybe explore in a different way in the future. It's not something that we had done in the past necessarily, but. But we can say that in terms of the inclination, it really helps quite a lot. What we've learned also is with this movement specifically, I would say it's maybe a little bit purer and cleaner than some others. So we kind of focus on the essentials of watchmaking, if you will. And that's also something that we like to explore further. And then it was the nightmare of making a ceramic case where we said if we should ever do that again, maybe we need a bit of a head start because with that case geometry, it was a magnificent challenge. It's definitely not something that we're going to reproduce in that way in the future. So when we say we discontinue movement, we're not looking to have a similar movement with two or three changes in the future. We really want to know, start from scratch for, for the next one.
- [13:52]
B
I remember vividly seeing the first gren forsey timepieces as a kid. I would go with my dad to Basel World. We would run through hole one, cross the bridge on the first floor to hole five. I believe it was five or two. Five. Two. And then it was the ahci and then Gerber started there and then to the right it was a little stand booth with the glass and the, the cut out case for the balance wheel. That was a, a lightning struck moment for me as a kid. I had that again because of you guys. And that I believe by then was sihh. Today watches and wonders with the handmade.
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A
Oh yeah, yeah.
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B
I spent literally maybe an hour with that I didn't have in my calendar running around as a retailer at the time. Aeon Foundation. And you literally put the watchmakers there at a bench at the fair.
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A
I remember.
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B
And I still even Born and raised into this industry, I still enjoy that the most. Whenever I do a manufacturer visit, this is the intro for me to speak about how much is handmade in everything you guys do, not just only the handmade collection or timepieces. So all the components are to a certain degree hand finished. Even those that are hardly visited you frost a lot, which is a signature Grubel 4C technique. You polish titanium bridges, which is extremely difficult titanium to polish. The beveling countersinks. Even the gold plate is engraved with the limited edition number where we off the C11. How many hands are physically working on each of these watches and roughly how long if you need to stick in total number of hours on average to your watches is made by hand.
- [15:57]
A
So talking about the handmade. So today we have the handmade one and the handmade two. So those are the first two movements that we offer with that name. And we wanted to be quite clear from the beginning what our definition of handmade actually is. Because if something is assembled by hand, by watchmaker, you could call it handmade, but that was not our definition. So across the collection, of course, everything is assembled by hand by one single watchmaker. Every surface of every component of every timepiece will be hand finished. But with the handmade, the big difference is that the components themselves, they're actually made with traditional machines and no numeric control whatsoever. So even there we wanted to be quite clear that we didn't machine the sapphire crystal by hand. In the handmade one, we weren't able to do the jewels by hand. Yet in handmade two, we saw we were able to add to our expertise in shaping the large jewel for the power reserve and then also the case gaskets for, for water resistance. That's not something that we chose to do by hand, even though it would not have been the most difficult part. But there is no added value in us doing this by hand. And everything else is done by hand using traditional old machines. And the big difference also between, in theory, everyone can make a handmade watch with the right machines, but in terms of the tolerances, so we're within microns. So it's basically the same tolerances as what we use for every other grub of 4C timepiece. So it was important that the quality was not lesser than you would find anywhere else. And in order to do that, the time that it takes to make a handmade one is 6000 hours if you add everyone's hours together. So there's like eight people in the handmade workshop and then some of our best hand finishers. So it's always going to be a team effort. So 6,000 for the handmade one and just below 6,000 for the handmade two. So we thought we were going to be a little bit more efficient, but we saw that we weren't going to be. And so this is how we work today.
- [18:14]
B
Amazing. I want to briefly take an intermezzo and jump to the mechanical nano that you've shown us at Shiba Watch days. So you had that on your wrist? I had time play around with it. The nano food royal, you guys called that the 10th fundamental invention, pushing it to 37.9 mil, I believe. Only 22 in white gold.
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A
Correct.
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B
Yeah. Maybe just a quick master class for our dear listeners that are not that familiar with the complication of a food drillant. Could you just school us a bit there? Why it's a nano? Because you've shrunk that to, I believe, just below 11 millimeters as well, which is very slim. Sure.
- [19:05]
A
So for us, the reason we call it a fundamental invention to start off with is that what we conduct within our R and D wing is fundamental research. So basically it's research that's not being conducted to achieve a certain product, but it's fundamental in the sense that it's exploring watchmaking in a very broad kind of way. And so the start of this was that we wanted to explore the constraints of space and energy within a wristwatch, which are the two main constraints that every watchmaker will find. And the idea was to see how these constraints could be overcome. And maybe, if you remember, one of the first sort of projects we had where we tried different things was that we tried to harness the wind created by the movement of the balance wheel as an energy source for a certain indication, which worked, but it didn't make it further than that. So it's now somewhere in one of our safes and maybe we'll be able to revisit that someday. But it was mostly trial and error and you learn as you go along. And our ambition has always been, and still remains, to have a 180 day power reserve within a hand wound mechanical movement. And the nano food railt is really the first milestone that we achieved where we would say, hey, this is something we can offer people because it really works. And to answer the question, why nano? It's not so much in terms of size, but more in terms of energy. So the food round takes its energy directly from the escapement. So the energy required is measured on a nanoscale, hence the name but then in turn, in using less energy, that means that we can get rid of an entire gear train, which you would usually need from a mainspring barrel or a secondary barrel. And with that, we can then end up with the nanofood round, flying tourbillon and flyback chronograph in, as you mentioned, a 37.9 millimeter case. So we saw that in solving an energy problem, we can also in turn solve a space problem. So that was the ambition that we had there. And I think the nanoflurant is a fantastic result of our R and D research.
- [21:38]
B
You spoke a bit about the vision and the DNA of the brand set out by Robert Greubel and Stephen Forsey. They built the brand on this philosophy of extreme mechanical expression. As you just explained wonderfully today as CEO, how do you carry that philosophy into a new collection era, also making the brand, I don't want to say accessible to new generations of collectors, but maybe visible.
- [22:10]
A
Sure. I mean, to be honest, I think we're very lucky with what Robert and Steven have built. You know, you've been to our atelier, which I think in terms of the infrastructure and know how it's. It's. It's really amazing. And every time I come to the office, every day, I'm like, wow, you know, this actually exists. And it's a very, you know, surreal amount of resources that are needed for only 200 timepieces a year. And then to carry it forward, I believe what's important is that the founding values, if you will, they're being held and defended by more than just one person. So we have quite a few team members who've been here for 15 years, 20 years, some even before Gruber Force existed as a brand. And for all of them, there's no other way of doing things than the way that we've been doing them for the past 20 years. So I think if you see any kind of change or deviation, you know, like the nanofood realm, for example, people said, oh, you know, that's incredible. You started making smaller timepieces now. And my answer was, yeah, but that project started like 10, 12 years ago. So it was always, you know, in the pipeline. So we don't really want to diverge from anything that Robert and Steven had intended for us to do. But of course, we want to build on it and continue to surprise and delight and actually mostly making this very insane approach to watchmaking as sustainable as we can.
- [23:50]
B
Talking of accessibility or visibility, you just mentioned that you've exhibited a la reserve. I'VE mentioned I've encountered you@baselworld Sihh. Why do you opt for La Reserve? Is it that there is no space at Watches and Wonders? You can't get the space you want there or you simply don't want to be there? Being at La Reserve has more benefits for you as a brand.
- [24:18]
A
I mean, we did SIHH for 10 years, or just over 10 years, which was good for what it was back then. But now more and more we see that it's important for us to have personal relationships with our collectors and we like to sit down, not for 10 minutes, for a quick photo shoot and then run to the next meeting. We want to spend quality time, I suppose. And the low reserve just happens to be fairly close to Palexpo, which makes it easy for people to access. And it's a different conversation when you can show a very high value timepiece in daylight or even on the terrace with some sunshine. And we want our collectors and friends to have a nice experience, basically. So while I would say plex was more B2B, I guess watches and wonders is still more B2B. It's not necessarily something that we're looking to extend. We do less official events than we used to withstands and all that. Again, reason being is just that we want to spend quality time and not have to rush. So it's fairly simple.
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B
You're going to less fairs maybe, but Geneva watch days this year you're partaking, in short.
- [25:39]
A
But you know, we're just in a hotel room, right? It's nothing, it's nothing special, but we like it. You know, if someone's hungry, we can order them a sandwich and we can, we can just spend, spend some time together.
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B
How do they correlate to each other? These, these, this, this fair in April and this fair in September for you as a brand.
- [25:58]
A
Well, I guess generally speaking, we meet more clients in April and we meet more press in September. I mean, put bluntly, that's basically, that's basically it. But we've seen more and more clients also come to Geneva watch days than in the first years, which is, which is great.
- [26:16]
B
Would you care to share your thoughts on the new Kid on the Block or the revived Baselworld Basilia? Or is it too fresh and you didn't form an opinion?
- [26:27]
A
Oh, I saw something. I have to admit, I don't think I'm in a position to comment because I haven't taken the time to actually read everything about it. From what I understood, it was more jewelry. Is that right? More jewelry or not necessarily I myself, I'm also.
- [26:44]
B
I didn't collect my thoughts. I actually know of it because you guys shared the awesome press company two eight nine. So we have to pry a bit more weight, but very interesting and it shows I'm actually again, I see that glass half full. It shows the essence of FaceTime. I don't mean on an Apple phone, but people coming together and that's what I love. People say that Geneva voice is more relaxed, laid back and Geneva Watch week in April is more international, more collectors. It's maybe more formal. So I only saluted. So. So that's my 2 cents on it for now.
- [27:29]
A
I mean, if I have a excuse to go to Basel to have the br, then I'm all for it. Yeah,
- [27:37]
B
totally. So you just mentioned that it's very important for you to meet your collectors as a brand and your beautiful art pieces are at a level that takes a lot of personal attention and touch in a relationship. How has the collector profile changed in the last three or four years for you as a brand? And are you seeing new geographies becoming more important?
- [28:11]
A
In terms of geographies, we, we. What we're trying to do is have a very balanced distribution. So we want to avoid having any single market or country be disproportionately more important than any other. So, you know, if there should be changes, then, you know, we would probably still want to avoid them. And so that helps us remain quite flexible. So if there should be an issue in some part of the world, you know, if we have, you know, a big part of our production tied up there, then, you know, we always, we would always be a little bit at risk. So the approach is to have a nice balance so that we don't have any, you know, bad surprises. In terms of the collector profile, I don't think that we've seen significant change. I would say the sort of common denominator with our collectors is that they're people who appreciate developing their own taste. So, you know, Grebel Forsey, you don't buy it for the brand name. You don't necessarily always buy it to, to show off, but you bought because, you know, you're far down the rabbit hole of watch collecting and you have a, usually, you know, a sincere appreciation for the craftsmanship and for the level at which we choose to work. So, you know, that that has always remained. Of course, you know, there are younger collectors also interested now, but that's always going to be the case. You know, we all unfortunately get older. I can feel it every day and you know, watch interest in watches is hopefully going to go down through the generations as it has. So I wouldn't say that is a significant change or deviation.
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B
I see that you don't really do direct sales because the two mono brand stores are in New York with your partner watch of Switzerland, Japan with Yoshida, sure. Could we conclude those are historically the strongest markets?
- [30:17]
A
Not necessarily, no. With Yoshida it was a very nice opportunity to be able to work with them and to have a nice space in Ginza. And we do appreciate having partners because again we're a small team so we're now 135total. But in terms of the commercial side of the business, there's really just a few of us. And in Japan there's just no way we would be able to satisfy our clients needs. And honestly, even for the US and other countries, we do appreciate working within a retail distribution framework and we don't have the ambition to do everything ourselves basically. So in terms of importance, we're around 25% for the US and South America, 25% Europe, 25 Middle east and then 25 Southeast Asia and Japan. And then some years one market is better than the other and then it changes. But generally again we try to avoid huge fluctuations.
- [31:26]
B
I see if I counted correctly only 24 doors worldwide and if I counted the New York and Tokyo double, it's only 22. How important are these retailers for you? And are there any ambitions to go direct to consumer?
- [31:42]
A
So I would say it's on a case by case basis. So we have some retailers who actually have zero allocation per year. But for us it's important to have someone in that region where our existing clients they can go talk to even if it's just to change a strap or to send a tile piece for service. So for us it's not about, you know, we don't really measure results in terms of sales but in terms of the service that that can be offered. And it's, it's really, I would say no two markets are, are alike. And, and it's something that, that works very well for us. And to, if you have an ambition to move to a direct sales model, I don't think so because we see, you know, that there is a certain risk involved in that. And again, we're comfortable where we are. We appreciate working with our partners who honestly make our lives easier as well. And we like to focus on watchmaking. So if we should develop some direct sales, it would be in markets where we have zero representation. So we would definitely not want to interfere in what our partners have built and should someone actually, in the past, we've done this before. If an end client wanted to buy directly from us, we still gave the retailer margin to the retailer, more as a matter of respect than anything else. So we try to not be too greedy.
- [33:17]
B
That's very elegant. And I say that as a retailer, we all salute you.
- [33:23]
A
We wouldn't be here without our retail network and it's important not to forget that. And we have our import export specialist. She says, you know, the people who, who you meet on your way up are the same people you're going to meet on your way down. So for us, it's important to have good relationships and to be respectful.
- [33:43]
B
After the watch has been sold as a new watch and another collector is very much in dire need to obtain that one leaves cpo. What's your stance on cpo and would you consider as a brand offering CPO on your own website and or via your own retail network, as we've slowly seen other artisanal hotelagerie brands offering slowly more and more. And of course, the biggest example is the Rolex CPO program, of course.
- [34:22]
A
So the answer is yes. And I'm going to give you a little bit of background. I feel that, if I may say this, the part of our business that didn't receive as much focus and attention as it could have in the past was that commercial aspect of the business. So we were making timepieces and we delivered them. And that's as far as it went, basically. So now we, as a first step, we tried to pay much closer attention to where is it going, how long might it be in stock, who is it sold to, and to adjust our production in that respect as well, we have started last year buying back a certain number of timepieces, and this year we're going to probably double the amount of timepieces we buy back. So the reason being, if someone is interested in, let's say, double balance sheet, you know, that client, instead of just building one, if we know that there is one available that's in Singapore, for example, and the client wants to buy in the us, we would buy it back and then deliver to another retailer. So we want to have the healthiest market possible. And we feel that if we continue to do this and we're a little bit patient, I would say early next year, we can roll out our CPO program as well, which we started to, but we want to have the best possible situation to actually roll that out.
- [35:58]
B
Will you incorporate your retailers into that program, yes, indeed. Talking about balancing those global markets. The world has been on fire. We can state that the luxury industry cooling down is an understatement. How insulated is a brand at your level of exclusivity? Insulated from such macro shifts. How do you plan for uncertainty as a leader of a brand?
- [36:28]
A
So we're, I want to say, thank God, almost completely insulated today. We're, you know, we're having a nice time. We're trying to, to handle our wait list as, as best as we can. Even though it's kind of a new situation for us to be, to be honest. So we're, we're, we're feeling confident. We don't, you know, we don't see any pressure. Again, when we set a balanced distribution, if something should happen, we can easily reallocate certain timepieces elsewhere. And the way we want to make this sustainable is not get too ambitious too quickly when things are going great. Because I feel like watchmaking is kind of cyclical. If it's a great year, everyone produces a lot of watches and then it's a bad year and oh, we have to lay off a bunch of people. So for us, even if there should be a demand for a lot more, it doesn't actually mean that we have to meet that demand. And that way we're comfortable where we're at and it allows us to focus more and more on quality, which has always been our top priority. But if we don't have production constraints in terms of quantities, we get more time to focus on our passion and in turn we feel that we should be more insulated to fluctuations as well.
- [37:50]
B
You mentioned a waiting list. On average, how long is the wait for a new consumer that wants to come into the global forsey world?
- [37:59]
A
It depends on the model, I would say. I mean the handmade two of course, is a very limited production, so the next one will be for 2032. Now some others are 2030 and some we try to do a little bit more. So it's, you know, we try to do our best. And to be honest, with the handmade, it's starting to be a little bit of a concern because, you know, not everyone's comfortable with, with the five, six year wait list. So we do try to increase production a little bit, but that would mean, you know, hopefully instead of three pieces a year, we make four. So it's still a very insignificant amount. And to be honest, in the past it's, it's not something we've experienced. So we're just kind of trying to figure out as we go along.
- [38:48]
B
Could we conclude that you've mentioned you have a small team, you're past 100. So again, that's relative to some atelier brands. Is your biggest bottleneck then people, watchmakers, engineers to grow.
- [39:04]
A
One big bottleneck is hand finishing. So even though it is actually our largest department, that has always been a bottleneck for us. And then watchmakers, yeah, in terms of engineering, R and D, we're very well set up. So it's around 20 people only for R and D. So in terms of the hand finishing, it's always been a bit of an issue and continues to be because one main reason for that is we don't really have two different types of quality of hand finishing. So whether it be an entry level or, you know, super high end, it's going to be the same dedication of execution, basically, of course, less components. But that, you know, that makes it supremely challenging for us. But it's, you know, it's a choice and I guess a matter of principle. So we'll see, we'll see. But hand finishing is definitely a big one.
- [39:59]
B
On a communication, marketing side of things, do you think we've reached a plateau in the evolution and novelties of what's happening and the ability to differentiate yourself as a brand? Do you see that as a bottleneck? I don't.
- [40:18]
A
Maybe I'm not the best person to ask because, you know, we've rarely barely done any marketing whatsoever. You know, today we have one person in charge of communications, but that's, you know, that's one person. Right. I write the press releases myself because I like doing it and it seems to be the most efficient way to do it today. So we can't really talk about marketing because we're in no position to comment. But for us, I guess as long as our brand or others, as long as it's authentic and you have credibility, I don't think you need to differentiate yourself through marketing necessarily. As long as you do it through the product that you're offering. That's for us, always been where we really want to stand out. And then sometimes it's appreciated, sometimes less, and sometimes it's underappreciated. And five years afterwards, everyone realizes how amazing that specific watch was. So our focus isn't on marketing. Making the best watches that we can and having great relationships with our clients and with our friends.
- [41:33]
B
Luxury that whispers a little bit.
- [41:35]
A
Yeah. Even though I pretend to do crazy stuff on Instagram, sometimes that's just for Instagram. That's not actually, you know, that's not actually our lifestyle and our marketing.
- [41:48]
B
Talk about lifestyle. You became CEO at a pivotal point for the brand. January this year, one of the founders, Stephen Forsey, stepped down from the company board. Is he still involved in the creative and technical direction? And if not, how much is Robert Grobel involved with the Day to Day?
- [42:09]
A
Sure. So Stephen is no longer involved and Robert is the president of the board. So not involved in Day to Day, but basically I call him every day anyway because we love talking about projects and what we're doing. But the idea for our founders was that the brand could one day become independent of them as founders. So there's not a thousand different ways of doing this, but the objective was for the team that we have internally to be able to take over all aspects of the business. And that's what we're still working on, what we're working on today.
- [42:48]
B
Final question. Dear Michel, if you could point to one thing that you feel is misunderstood about global foresight, something you wish more people really grasped about what the atelier does, what would it be?
- [43:05]
A
That's a good question. Hold on, give me like a second to think here. I think, okay, so I might have an answer. I might change my answer in a few days, but off the top of my head, what we've seen a few times is that when we present a new movement, it's being judged within the context of what exists during a specific time. And with the handmade, for example, when we presented it, we had trouble explaining it to people. And we've heard some people said that they were under the impression that every Swiss watch was made by hand. And we realized that something project like this had not really existed in the past. Same thing with the nanofood round. We were very. We were quite worried, actually, if people would understand, if they would appreciate how unparalleled something like this is. So usually it takes a while. Honestly, there are so many examples. The perpetual calendar that we launched in 2014, it took a few years for people to realize what an exceptional mechanical innovation it was. So the misunderstanding being that we're just a watch brand making watches for a specific market is one that I hope to overcome one day where people realize that behind almost everything that we do, there's actually a significant R and D investment. And for Robert and Stephen, for all of us, we hope that each timepiece that we're able to present add something of value to the industry and to the history of watchmaking. And we don't see our timepieces as products, but something that is meaningful and a form of artistic expression, if you will.
- [44:57]
B
You actually gave me a brainwave because I always said one of the best of the best is Greubel Forsey. You guys are too modest. I don't think you are, but you are. And I said you're friendly. And it is luxury that whispers because you guys whisper where everybody doesn't use a bullhorn but sound systems that we have at house parties. You just gave me a brainwave. I'm going to discuss this with Rob. My co founder and co host is to do a dedicated global 4C series where we run down a caliber in every episode and we do a deep dive into technicality.
- [45:37]
A
Oh my God. Yeah, we're gonna spend, well, 31 episodes, right? Well, I mean it's 35 now, but it's gonna be 40 soon.
- [45:46]
B
So here you go. If you, dear listener, won 40 episodes with Michel and or his colleagues, send us a message. Michel, thank you so, so much for sitting down with me. I was truly honored. I've enjoyed every minute. Looking forward to seeing September.
- [46:02]
A
Thank you, Alan. Looking forward to seeing you.
- [46:05]
B
And you, dear listener, thank you so much for taking the time to listen to this episode. You can find all our previous episodes on our website www.therealtime.show. you can find us on Instagram herealtime show. If you want to support the show, please subscribe, like rate and definitely share it with your friends. If you have any questions, feedback and or criticism, please do send us a message. You can also DM us if you'd like to join the TRTS community on WhatsApp. You can find Scarlet on the Gram S C A r l I n t h e s h I r e David, you can find that d a v a u c h e r Rob o b n u d dds and me just do at and my full name alone. Joseph. If you prefer to send us an email, you can just add a first name to herealtime show like our ig handle Stay sane and keep on ticking. Sam.