After the major watch groups, you are now at the head of a new brand; do you prefer small structures?

It is not really an issue, since I really enjoyed working both for Omega and for Piaget. Nonetheless, good professionals are no longer able to do their real job because they are too bogged down by internal paperwork. Moreover, the key luxury brands tend to place themselves above their clientele, instead of on its level. After all these years spent in the watch industry, I want to devote my energy to delivering know-how and to orienting it towards the customer.

Badollet is yet another watch brand; what makes it stand out from the crowd?

The type of timepieces that are created and the service that accompanies them. We want to return to a notion of luxury as a personalised and intimate experience. When a customer enters a store to buy a watch worth over 200,000 Swiss francs, he or she expects a certain level of service, both during and after the acquisition. We offer a whole new dimension to what the other bands are doing: the client enjoys direct and effortless access to customer service by simply making a call. Thanks to a partnership with the upscale conciergerie firm Quintessential, our client will have a number available 24/7 throughout the entire warranty period. During these five years, the watch will also be eligible for three full maintenance services. This means no trips to and from the retailer’s and also the opportunity of a genuine replacement watch while the model is being serviced. Customers will also enjoy personalised access to our site where they can engage keep in contact with all the brand’s departments, get a strap changed or submit any other type of request… We will handle absolutely everything. Indeed, in the medium term, we plan to offer our customers some highly sophisticated personalised watch products.

To you really think customers still believe in taglines such as “since 1655”?

Even if such figures are not essential, they may be interested if there is some substance behind the claim. I’m obviously not going to say it has just been “defrosted” after a long sleep since 1655! The brand has roots and above all a sense of perspective conferred by these roots. Badollet was awarded the first prize from the Geneva Chronometry Observatory on the year of its creation in 1872, and was one of the watchmakers that officially worked with Breguet. In an entirely different field, members of the Badollet family have exercised top-level political functions both in Geneva and the United States. Watchmakers through successive generations stretching from 1655 to 1924, they experienced the entire odyssey of the timepiece and worked in particular on twin gathering-pallet escapements. It thus seems to us essential to escape from the one-track obsession with the Swiss lever escapement and to offer an alternative to passionate mechanical watchmaing enthusiasts such as with this type of escapement.

What will the first models to be released actually look like?

Badollet is not going to create only wristwatches, but also other types of timepieces. Among the first objects that tell the time, we will in particular be presenting a mechanical hourglass with a tourbillon regulator. The first collection of wristwatches is based on tourbillons with flying carriages featuring an unprecedented construction principle. Without wishing to offer the most complicated or the largest watch, it is the actual way of developing and presenting the movement that is innovative. Why not come up with an oscillating weight crafted from meteorite, or a tourbillon carriage set with specific gemstones? We are offering two main approaches within this initial collection: a neo-classical watch half-way between the wristwatch and the classical watch; and a more modern watch with a case entirely made from sapphire with only the bare minimum of metal.

What are your priorities and your five-year objectives?

The five-year goal is to establish Badollet as a niche brand offering extremely upscale watches combining creativity with the top-notch Genva traditions of fine craftsmanship, but without conveying a designer-watch image. We are taking a far more classic direction than Richard Mille, which offers extraordinary and highly distinctive models. Badollet will have its own style. We therefore need to structure the company by working with special partners to create movements and exterior elements on a par with our clients’ high demands. Distribution will initially be handled directly on some markets with a handful of cutting-edge retailers, since we are looking at around one hundred watches next year if all goes well, and five hundred watches and objects within the next five years if we remain in the same price segment.