The image
Richard Mille the man and Richard Mille the brand are nigh on indistinguishable, because, unlike many other brands, all the ideas and creations start in the mind of Richard Mille, then make their way into the brand’s production.
For 2011, Richard Mille’s mind is set on North and South America.
Richard Mille, in partnership with John Simonian, President of Ildico, the United States distributor of Richard Mille, opened the first boutique in Beverly Hills in November of 2010.
“My objective is to have a presence in terms of image - I am not obsessed with opening up boutiques, I think of it as more of a showroom for the brand,” Mille explains. “My ladies watches are less successful, because most of the retailers are watch technical people, they are sharp and very macho, and 90 per cent of their clientele are men. The boutique is to enhance and promote the ladies versions, to spread the word. My boutiques are not macho temples. I have seen that the sales of the ladies models are really booming in the boutiques, and I like that. My objective was to launch a ladies model without losing my soul and without losing the technical image I have. I wanted to combine both worlds in harmony. The watch is feminine, but it still very mechanical.”
The Richard Mille boutique in Beverly Hills will share the same DNA as other Mille boutiques around the world, but with a distinctive American feeling.
The current situation
Business is coming back after the downturn of the worldwide economic crisis. “So far we have nothing to complain about, despite the problems one hears discussed daily,” says Mille. “Sales this year have been higher than last year, and even last year’s turnover was much higher than the year before…so we are really pleased. Nonetheless, we will not sit back and relax because of that, we will work even harder to keep this upward trend going strong.”
Mille sees the watch industry breaking up into niches, with each niche existing on its own and not necessarily impacting the others.
“The market is ‘splitting up’ into segments, separate areas,” he details. “It used to be that a general trend, like hemlines, caught on and went worldwide. Now, you have to have smaller, flatter watches, large watches, simple watches, complicated watches … there are no really general, broad trends anymore and everyone follows their own taste, and as a watch brand you have to offer everything to the public.
“We are watching a few trends,” he continues. “It is interesting to see that since I introduced my RM 020 tourbillon pocket watch a few years ago, pocket watches are getting more attention from several brands than was previously the case. Also, we are seeing more ultra flat models being introduced, after we had launched the RM 016, a few years ago.”
The strongest markets for Richard Mille timepieces are Asia, followed by the European Union and then the United States, and Mille is optimistic about the coming year. “We are feeling totally confident about 2011,” he says. “We believe it could even become better than expected with the general market mood becoming even more positive.”
RM 017 TOURBILLON
SIHH
For SIHH, the Richard Mille booth has been expanded to make more space available, and the method of presentation has been tweaked and improved.
“It’s hard to choose just one new product to talk about for 2011, but for me, the most exciting product would have to be the new RM 017 Tourbillon with its titanium base plate,” Mille says. “I really love rectangular forms, and I have always wanted to produce a tourbillon in a similar case to the RM 016, keeping the look of depth of the movement design despite the fact that this watch is very thin. It was hard to achieve, but now I’ve achieved the look I want and it will be fantastic.”
“I am having fun because what I love is to work on new developments,” Mille continues. “It’s fun all the time, and for me it’s only pleasure. I develop new models, I have fun, though sometimes there are headaches with problems and issues to figure out, but in the end, it all works out. My only problem is to define the proper planning for each model. You always know when you start, but you never know when it will end.”
A key case in point is the Richard Mille numbering system which, believe it or not, was supposed to be logical and in order. However, once some watches were delayed, things got out of hand. “It’s a mess,” Mille admits. “I put the numbers in the order of their creation, so RM 018 was introduced way before RM 025, but RM 025 is already on the market, while RM 018 has not yet been delivered.”
The reason for the delays? “When you think you have solved a problem, then you have ten more problems,” Mille explains. “I love the challenge and the problems. Taking seven years to bring 30 watches to market sounds like nonsense, but this is the way I love my watches to be. In Formula One, it’s just like this – a huge amount of work and research to release only a few models, like the Richard Mille brand. I don’t want to change this way of working. Two years ago I made about 2,000 units, last year I did less than 2500, this year maybe 2,800, my target for the long run is to do 5,000 pieces and no more. This is exactly the bracket where I want to stay.”
Mille wants to spend his time on research and development and design, not in marketing, which is what he would have to do if he moved into higher volumes. “When you go over those limits, you enter another world where you spend more time in the commercial realm, more time with artificial things and less time to take care of technical and design details,” he says. “My strategy doesn’t prevent me from making money. The objective is to have good economical results, but I invest a lot in research and development.“
Richard Mille is seen as a provocateur in the watch industry and he relishes this role. “My friends in the art world tell me that the successful artists were all provocateurs,” he says. “What I do is very provocative, it is a rupture, but at the same time, there is a lot of legitimacy to the products. I compensate for my lack of history with a pure, genuine product. Nowadays when marketing talks very loudly, it is more important than ever to be genuine and very honest. I fight against marketing devices because it doesn’t correspond to extreme luxury. Today, we have final clients who are very aware of what is happening in the watch industry, they know the truth about all the brands, and sometimes the clients know more about the watches than the sales people in the retailers. They are passionate and they know a lot about the brand, so it’s more important to be genuine. You cannot lie. When you reach the level of prices that I am at, it’s very important that people understand why it’s so expensive. They know that my watches are unbelievable in terms of technique, every watch starts from a blank sheet, and at the end of the day, they are very complex and in only very limited series.”
The future for Richard Mille holds more of the same. “We will continue to combine the best of extreme technique and innovation with the best of artistic and architectural dimension,” Mille details. “Contrary to the people who are obsessed by volume, trying to increase production every year, I am more interested in hearing people say that they were surprised by our new watch, our new developments. My only objective is to carry on surprising people. We will still have limited production, limited distribution, and we will work with friends and we will enjoy developing crazy objects.”
Source: Europa Star December - january 2011 Magazine Issue
