The Future Is Now

Jaeger-LeCoultre’s Deputy CEO Geoffroy Lefebvre talks to Candice Chan ahead of the SIHH in January about Polaris, a new men’s collection that’s riding the tech wave

- Candice Chan

 Johann Rupert, chairman of the Swiss-based luxury-goods conglomerate Richemont (parent company of brands such as Cartier, Jaeger-LeCoultre and Van Cleef & Arpels) wasn’t joking when he said, “I want to see less grey-haired men [in management]”.

Meet Geoffroy Lefebvre, deputy CEO of Jaeger-LeCoultre, and widely expected as next in line to helm the brand since Georges Kern left Richemont in 2017. The 40-year-old INSEAD graduate worked at management consultancy firm McKinsey & Company before joining Richemont in 2011 as its global industry director. Since then, he was Vacheron Constantin’s managing director of operations for slightly more than two years before assuming his current position at Jaeger-LeCoultre.

WILL YOU BE IMPLEMENTING CHANGES TO JAEGER-LECOULTRE’S CURRENT POSITIONING?

I think we are lucky to be serving male and female clients equally and we don’t want that to change. We won’t see a change in the price brackets. The level of quality and the amount of work and passion that we put into our watches, and specifically our entry-level products, provide an excellent price-to-value ratio today so this is something we do not want to change. Our prices are not going to go up: We still want to be present in the entry range segment — and I mean entry range as defined for Jaeger-LeCoultre to be about $10,000 for men’s watches and a little lower for the Reverso line. The new Polaris collection we are introducing at the SIHH will have an entry price similar to that of the Master Control.

TELL US MORE ABOUT THE POLARIS COLLECTION.