Asia-2012-October-v11 9/30/12 3:37 PM Page 51
Watch Report
If the price fits... These timepiece brands take on the vibrant Asian market with carefully calibrated pricing strategies BY MELISSA SILVA
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sia is a prime market for watches today, with several brands making impressive strides in the category across the region. The demand for a more affordable price range is becoming more and more apparent, so much so that Lambretta Watches’ Sales Director of Travel Retail Beatrice Düring believes good pricing has become more of a fashion accessory than the timepiece itself. Fashion, lifestyle and accessories company Fossil seems to agree, as the brand recently identified a “conservative” trend with customers placing orders earlier this year. Sales have picked up since, with the end of the year looking promising. A focus on visual merchandising and sales training likely helped the brand capture this upswing. Top UK watch brand Sekonda seems to be trend-friendly with the strategic pricing of its watches between US$30 and $200. “There’s a very small percentage traveling through airports who can afford to spend thousands of dollars on a watch,” says David Merriman, Managing Director, Sekonda. “We look at ourselves being a little more ‘democratic.’ Our aim is volume and to make it as easy as possible for the consumer and the retailer.” Sekonda has put the idea of making things easy into practice with a special selfselect unit, which offers dummy samples in a presentation box at the top. The customer can have a look at the samples and select a watch of interest. When they remove one, the gravity fed system replaces it with another. It’s also easy for sales staff and merchandisers, Merriman explains. When they receive the stock from the warehouse all they have to do is look at the dummy sample, see where it is on the selection and put the new stock in. Another system, designed for lower priced watches, is the “Euro hanger” system. The price point is given at the top of the display and all the watches below it are under that
From left: Part of Fossil’s Holiday 2012 collection are boyfriend-inspired “Heather” in rose, military-inspired “Nate” in grey with leather strap, and “Emma” in bone, with white leather strap and mother of pearl dial
price. There are pictures of the watches down the middle with the watches arrayed on either side. Currently in Asia, as elsewhere, there’s a strong market shift away from the higher end of the market in favor of affordability, thanks in large part to the Eurozone crisis and panAmerican recession. But for some customers a more affordable price tag equates to a lowquality product, so the task for retailers is to find the proverbial happy medium, especially when dealing with Asia, where customers have a keen eye for value. Brands like Lambretta Watches keep an eye out for global trends regardless of the pressure to sell within an affordable price range. “We’re open minded and don’t hesitate to try out and discuss new ideas with our customers,” says Düring. “As a young, dynamic and small company, we are very flexible and encourage our staff to think creatively.” Creativity and flexibility appear to be aiding Lambretta in Asia, as the company has already exhibited at three travel retail fairs there—ARC Singapore, ARC Shanghai and
TFWA AP Singapore. Lambretta’s exposure at these conferences has brought the company promising contacts in the region, and probably helped it snag recent listings on several Asian airlines. Exposure such as this is critical, and probably contributed to Lambretta producer Capella Industries’ turnover increase of 45% this past June compared to the same period last year, setting the stage for a robust endof-year turnover. As a result, the company’s staff has increased by 20% to handle the growing demand.
Watching the winners Sekonda places a huge emphasis on maintaining brand exposure, to the point that whenever a new airport retailer opts for one of the brand’s displays, Sekonda will supply it free of charge. “We obviously don’t know what watches sell in a particular country, but we do know what our bestsellers are,” says Merriman. “So we do the first selection and after six months we send somebody in who works
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