There’s a reason that Cartier is one of the small handful of brands that not only weathered the seismic life-changing storms of 2020, but actually continued to excel, gain market share and grow in profitability. And that is because it is creating exactly the watches that we, the collectors and consumers, want to purchase. Now, this may sound like a simple thing but it is actually the most complex, intuitive process there is in the luxury business, and I would go so far as to say the vast majority of the watch world still struggles with it. Because it goes much further than engaging your clients in a dialogue to better understand their needs. It goes much further than having a sensitivity in watch design that evokes the zeitgeist of the modern world while remaining true to yourself. In reality, it is a complex act of psychoanalysis. Because what Cartier has managed to do is to somehow reach inside our collective subconscious, and extract from it the exact, precise watches that we want and then make them real.
I believe Cartier’s success at this has everything to do with the maison’s current CEO, Cyrille Vigneron, who is truly tapped into the psychology of the market. For customers, there is a time to challenge and excite them, and there is a time to comfort and reassure them. In the five years since he’s taken the helm of the luxury juggernaut, he has focused on the latter rather than the former. Why? Well, to be honest, when he took over Cartier, its watch division was characterised by extremely ambitious technical watchmaking and incredible in-house movement creation that, nevertheless, was somehow disconnected from the Cartier watches we actually wanted. Time and again, you would hear collectors and journalists reference the watches from the Collection Privée Cartier Paris (CPCP) overseen by Hélène Poulit-Duquesne in the ’90s. These watches reached into Cartier’s treasure trove of icons and recreated the maison’s venerated watches with subtle modern improvements. Twenty-plus years on, with a watch culture obsessed about all things vintage, with consumers retuning to classic sizes, with wearability and elegance on the wrist becoming increasingly important, the CPCP watches are more relevant than ever. When Vigneron took over Cartier, rather than simply bringing the CPCP project back, he applied its principles across his entire brand but this time at a more accessible entry point. The results have been brilliant. Says Eric Ku, world-renowned watch collector and Cartier devotee, “When Vigneron took over
