Time Bytes Back

While selling watches online is still in the future of many a storied watchmaker, the multi-channel option seems inevitable. We investigate

- Josh Sims

When it comes to selling their wares, Audemars Piguet keeps it old school, with brick-and-mortar and a welcoming smile. "We find it better to have that personal relationship with potential customers, given the limited number of watches we make," explains the brand's Managing Director for the UK, Daniel Compton. "It's not just an anonymous transaction. But we don't have an aversion to the alternative." The alternative of which Compton speaks is, of course, selling online.

It is something the watch industry has fought shy of far longer than most other product sectors, the likes of high-end fashion, for example. The thinking has been simple: expensive, craft products deserve and, indeed, maybe even demand to be purchased with an element of fanfare, with expertise to hand and opportunity in play. "I think things happen [when you go into a store]. You get to try on watches you might otherwise not try," reckons Compton. "It's experiential - and I think customers take pleasure in that."

All of which is fine, if you have access to a brand's physical store or - since this has long been the way watches have been sold too to a store belonging to one of its retail accounts. But much as these accounts were quick to get into e-commerce in order to have regional, if not always global, reach their first priority being to sell watches, by any means necessary, not building brands - so watchmakers are increasingly cutting their own path online too.