Business News Audemars Piguet, Girard-Perregaux, And Richemont-Backed FHH To Offer Public Online Training And Education Classes As Watchmakers Face Headwinds

Called FHH Boutique, the e-commerce platform will offer video training, tests, and certification designed to enhance the profile of Swiss watchmaking among both consumers and industry experts. The French language video programs and courses have been dubbed in English and German. They are also available with subtitles in other languages and dialects, including Arabic, Japanese, Cantonese, Mandarin, Spanish, Korean, and Italian. They've been updated in hopes of appealing to a younger and more gender-diverse audience, FHH officials said at an event in Geneva last week, which also saw the launch of a new public industry exhibit called 'Watch Makers.'

"Culture is something that constantly has to be nurtured and reinvented. But to do that you have to be initiated and that's why you have to go deep to nourish the culture, otherwise it could just disappear because it's not part of necessity,'' Cyrille Vigneron, the former Chief Executive Officer and current Chairman of Culture and Philanthropy at Cartier, said at the event.

The initiative comes as the Swiss watch industry struggles with a downturn in exports and sales following a post-pandemic era boom. Sales in China, once the largest single market for Swiss watches, have fallen sharply amid a real estate crisis that has hit key Swatch Group and Richemont brand sales. Meanwhile, consumers in the U.S., the top market for Swiss watches and a key driver of growth for a decade, are facing uncertainty as the threat of tariffs looms over the industry. Richemont's Vigneron, who steered a revival and surge in sales at Cartier's watch division by focusing on the French jewelry brand's classic model designs, said the Swiss watch industry needs to constantly make itself relevant to the next generation, as the industry makes a product that, due to the ubiquity of mobile phones, is no longer needed to tell time. "We have to be careful that even if we think things are forever, they are never forever,'' he said.  

The event was also attended by Audemars Piguet Chief Executive Officer Ilaria Resta and Sowind Group Chief Executive Officer Patrick Pruniaux. They both pledged support for the FHH's new public-facing messaging plan.

Through programs such as the FHH Academy and FHH Forum, the Foundation states that it has trained and educated over 40,000 individuals and issued more than 15,000 certificates to students in watchmaking. The FHH Forum, an annual gathering to promote the industry, will also be held outside Switzerland for the first time this year, taking place in New York City on October 17. For more information and to receive a 20% discount on training courses from the FHH, click here.