ES: How's business?
MT: Business is great, exceedingly positive. What we are finding is that all the stars are aligned, the manufacturers are pumping up capacity, we are getting more interesting watches into the market (aesthetically and technically) and the global markets are booming right now. The business can only do better and we are very positive about the outlook in Asia.

ES: How has business changed in recent years?
MT: We had a few events in Asia over the past ten years – things that really impacted business. We had the Asian crisis, which gave retailers a knock on the head, we had September 11th and we had SARS. For the last five years, we have been pretty calm. The markets have rebalanced themselves and really grown. We have been able to position ourselves in the marketplace. We adopted the right business, marketing and merchandising strategies, so we have really benefited from the global environment.





ES: What is the secret of your success?
MT: I would say that one of the key reasons is that we have developed an incredible level of trust between our clientele and us. They know that when they step into the Hour Glass, they won’t get short-changed. There is trust in our long-term approach to client relationships, after-sales service and it extends beyond that. For example, for some VIP clients, we offer a ‘watch valet service’. We have a lot of clients who live around the region and should they need a watch repaired, we will make sure it is done. Because we have such a geographic spread, when our clients travel, they will have our office do their travel arrangements for them, book their hotels, their restaurants.
We’ve been very successful with our merchandising strategy. We have been able to identify new approaches. We have a narrow range but we go deep in merchandising. We were one of the first champions of independent watchmaking, back seven years ago.

ES: Tell us about marketing Hour Glass.
MT: In our marketing approach, we do things quite differently. About ten years ago, we started chanting the education mantra. Many retailers don’t want their customers to know too much. The Hour Glass sees itself as the watch world’s leading cultural retail enterprise and this gives us great responsibility. We can’t just be a leader in terms of sales but we need to also be a leader in terms of how future generations of watch consumers look at watches and the way they buy watches. We want to influence that, and to do that we have to educate our clients to the best of our ability. We hold a lot of programmes dedicated to the global development of watch culture and we want to raise the consciousness of consumers.

ES: What is your relationship like with other retailers?
MT: Asia is a highly competitive, intense market. We keep a friendly competitive spirit. In America, in each market you will have a couple of retailers. Here, in Singapore, we have over 15 – 20 watch retailers. In Hong Kong, there’s a watch retailer every two metres along the key stretches of the shopping district.





ES: What do you like about your job?
MT: I have a great passion for watches. Everyone who works here loves watches, a lot of the employees collect watches. Being a collector myself, I enjoy merchandising watches, and I love being able to spot the next big thing.
I think it's important to have a broad overview of the market, but also to be very close to the ground. You have to know what customers are enjoying. You have to have a large network to depend on and be able to sniff things out. You know when something is good and when something is not, it’s an intuitive feeling. Out of ten times, I am wrong once or twice.

ES: What don't you like?
MT: In the industry today – the larger you get the more political you have to be. It’s a balancing act, especially when you are dealing with a lot of different suppliers. You have to be able to be a great politician.

ES: What is the biggest challenge facing your store right now?
MT: Apart from the competition, store formats will have to increase in size. You see the trend in Asia where before 100 – 150 square metres (1076 - 1615 square feet) was sufficient and 200 square metres (2,153 square feet) was large, now you have retailers opening up stores that are 500 square metres (5382 square feet), stores that are 2,000 square metres (21,528 square feet). This is because many brands are trying to enhance visibility with more retail space. This is very challenging. There is only so much space you can dedicate to each brand.
We do a mix of shops-in-shops and corners. The Hour Glass has always believed in the concept of providing brand corners, which are the best examples of the brand image and values. There is, however, a limit to the amount of space that can be given to them.

ES: What is the biggest challenge facing the watch industry right now?
MT: At the brand level, there are several issues – there is a capacity constraint and that won’t be resolved for another three to five years. The source of movements is the second issue. A lot of brands are going to have to source their own components, which also takes time to scale up. Many brands are bringing component manufacturing back in-house.
There is a shortage of competent watchmakers as well and many brands are unwilling to take a watchmaker away from manufacturing for after-sales.
But after-sales service is the biggest issue of all. I don’t think the brands are dedicating enough resources to it. It’s not a new issue. After-sales service has just deteriorated for most brands, and the lead time is just getting longer and longer. With the increasing number of technical, complex watches being produced; I can’t see the situation getting any better.
For most brands, any product that is a perpetual calendar and above has to go back to the factory for service, which creates a huge bottleneck. I think many brands are more concerned with revenue than in customer satisfaction.

ES: How important is customer service?
MT: It’s becoming increasingly important, if not the most important factor to success, to have great customer service. If you don’t follow things through with great client service, you are not going to get the customers to come back. We depend on repeat client sales.

ES: How do you do training?
MT: We do it in various ways. We have to be thought leaders and educators in the watch industry. As a result, we spend a lot of time on training. We spend on average, per staff member, 85 hours a year on training. We have brand partners coming in and conducting training, we have guest speakers come in, and we do the training ourselves. Sometimes we have clients come in and speak to our employees.

ES: How important is security?
MT: It depends on the territory. There are some countries where we have armed guards and others where the doors are left open. Singapore is a safe environment and as long as we are vigilant, we don’t need armed guards. In Malaysia, we have to have armed guards.

ES: Are you optimistic about the future?
MT: Yes, very. There’s a phenomenal tailwind behind us right now. Unless there is a super scale disaster, natural or man-made, I don’t see the markets rocking very much.

ES: What is your favourite watch?
MT: One of the watches that inspires me the most is the Vianney Halter Antiqua. It’s a perpetual calendar with four sub-dials and for me, this is one of the watches that really marked and started a new history of watch aesthetics for the watch industry. For me, everything is pre-Antiqua and post-Antiqua. I think that watch has influenced designers greatly. I am, however, wearing a yellow gold Rolex Daytona with a black dial right now.


Source: Europa Star December-Januar 2008 Magazine Issue

EUROPA STAR LAUNCHES TRAINING COURSE FOR RETAILERS