Transcript
Alon Joseph (0:00)
Foreign.
Jula Aloma Joseph (0:06)
Watch fans and welcome to another edition of the Real Time show with me, your friendly neighbor, Jula Aloma Joseph, all the way from Amsterdam, welcoming to the virtual studio and dear, dear old friend and a guest that I've never met in person yet, but have been admiring for three decades already. I want to welcome to the studio the Flying Dutchman, Luko Princen. Welcome Luke.
Luko Princen (0:34)
Hi.
Alon Joseph (0:34)
Welcome Alon.
Luko Princen (0:35)
Happy to be here.
Jula Aloma Joseph (0:37)
And Mr. Oliver Eick, the Swiss guy that founded co founded an epic watch brand, ikeepod. And guess where the Ike comes from. Welcome Oliver.
Alon Joseph (0:50)
Thank you very much for having me.
Jula Aloma Joseph (0:53)
Well, the pleasure and honor is all ours. Why we're all here together in the studio because I've been jumping for joy for having you both on the show separately. Luke is literally Flying Dutchman because he's flying all around the world and too busy to sit down with me. But I wanted to have him on the mic because he co founded Ligure Watches and I wanted to do an episode for that. So he promised to come back on. And you, Oliver, we have so much to unpack with you about ikeepod, so I've asked you to come back on the show as well to do a full episode on that. So our dear listeners, we'll come back to you with two more episodes with both gentlemen separately. But before we dive in, why we're here together because you guys teamed up on a very cool project together. Foligura Watches marrying the Carl Schmidt foundation that you, Oliver, preside over as president of the board of trustees. And that culminated into a very cool limited edition. And that's the reason for this party today. I wanted to just pause for a moment and do a brief intro. So Luke, you and I met when you were actually the president of a Bell and Concorde. But you go way back in the watch industry, so the honor is yours. Please give us an intro from where you started and why you decided to start your own brand, the Google Watches.
Luko Princen (2:29)
Yeah, it goes back even alone to when I met your father. That was in the mid-90s dealing with Beau Mercier in Amsterdam, your company. And actually I started in in the luxury industry in the early 90s working for Bowser Lump. It's an company from the United States being active in optical products. And I worked in the Ray Ban sunglasses division for a couple of years. And actually my Predecessor there was Mr. Thomas van der Kelly, you know him as well, very impressive guy. Also within career in the watch industry. And he moved to Richemont and I took over his position at Beaujan long for a couple of years in the Netherlands and yeah, after I think it was four or five years, he asked me to to join Richemont in Amsterdam and for the brand Bon Mercier. So I worked a couple of years together with Thomas van der Keller for Beaumarche and then Rivemont started to grow. They started to add brands in the multi brand division which was Bon Mercier, Piaget, Vacheron Constantin, Officine, Panerai and Montblanc. So I started with those five brands in sales in the Netherlands, then sales marketing for the Netherlands Nordic countries. And then in 1999 Richemont decided to open an European hub in Munich. And I was appointed as brand manager for Piaget in Munich and covering their 15 or 16, 50, 16 countries to lead Piaget. And then after a couple of years they added Vacheron Constantin to my portfolio. And in 2005 I was appointed as wholesale director Cartier for the same zone. So still being based in Munich, covering Northern Europe zone, also director Cartier. And it was actually kind of misfit, you know, it's a fantastic brand, fantastic team. They're French and I'm Dutch and I speak a lot of languages but I don't speak French well enough and I didn't feel well in that culture. That can happen. So nothing wrong with cache on that side. But I didn't fit in. I could feel that. And yeah, luckily enough, after I think nearly a year, I think was exactly a year working for Cartier, I had this opportunity to join Ebel, which was at that time in 2005 just acquired by the Movado Group, the stock list American company. They bought EEL from LVMH and they appointed me as an wholesale director for Northern Europe. So still the same zone, still being based in Munich. And I covered this position for four years. And after four years, yeah, we had the financial crisis 2009, 2008, 2009 and the president at that time of Ebel, he was laid off and they asked me to take over that position. So for a couple of years I was the first co president of the brand because I did it in an co presidency with Mark Michel Amadri, currently CEO of Sierra Perigo. And then after two years he left. And the last year I was on my own running as a president both in EBEL and Concord Worldwide. And then there was a reorganization taking place at Movado. They moved product development, strategic marketing to the United States headquarters. So actually they carved out my position and well, it was actually the last year I entered I was still running E. Bell and Concord for Europe and Asia, but, but you could feel that my expiring date was approaching and I could find a very nice deal with the management of the Movado Group to set up my own company. They, they supported me very well and I took over in 2005 the sales and marketing team of the subsidiary in Munich. And yeah, I started my own company as a sales and trade marketing agency with the main brand Ebel covering Germany, Austria and the Dutch market. And yeah, gradually I added a couple of brands in my portfolio and today I have most recently added the beautiful high end brand Arnold and Son Angelus and as well as the jewelry brand Copain and Fabri Leuba. That's actually together with Ebel is my current portfolio. Yeah, and in between, and it was during the Corona period in 2020, we were all grounded at home or in a home office. And yeah, people had apparently more time to step back a little bit and connect with old friends. And so did Peter Van Geet, who happened to be one of my colleagues at Bausch and Lomb back in the early 90s. And he was living in those days together with Janika who also worked for Baos and Lomb. Meanwhile, they were married. They are married. They are married, living in northern Italy. And he searched me on LinkedIn and said, Luke, how are you doing?
