REVOLUTION_International_Vol 54

Mr Christoph Grainger-Herr needs no introduction.
The current CEO of IWC was once a Swiss
professional skier and architect, and he’s spent
the last few years holding two portfolios in the company,
designing the brand’s new Manufakturzentrum and
directing the development and expansion of the brand’s
releases. Now that the new manufacuture is up and running
smoothly, upping IWC’s capacity to produce more of its
in-house movements and components, he’s set his sights
on upgrading customer experiences within and outside
of IWC’s boutiques, both via formal and unexpected
experiences with the brand. Last year, he popped into
Singapore to re-open the brand’s refreshed boutiques at
ION Orchard and The Shoppes at Marina Bay Sands, and
invited a few cycling enthusiasts and collectors along for a
40-klick cycle along the coast. We went along and just about
barely made it out alive, while Mr Grainger breezed along.
We finally found ourselves at the exclusive members-only
club 1880, where we sat down to talk about luxury retail and
its rapid evolution today.
Mr Grainger, thank you for joining us today. What do you
currently see as the biggest changes in retail today that
you’re trying to address or confront?
It is something that a lot of brands are not paying enough
attention to, or at least not paying enough attention to how
it’s changing. I think it’s the fundamental realization that
we make highly personal and highly emotional products
that carry a lot of meaning. So it’s not something you buy
on a spec sheet of functionality, it’s something that you
buy because it makes you feel special in a certain way. And
I think that this really comes first and foremost, from a
human-to-human interaction, a relationship and in the
end, the friendship, That’s why I think the difference today
between brands that you theoretically like, and what you
decide to buy into, is all down to human factors. That’s
why it’s important to focus on our direct interaction with
our clientele.
Retail is an important pillar for your brand equity. What
else matters?
Our core pillars for brand equity extend beyond product
design. It’s in how you express the narrative. The story
about our product is not only that they are very precise
wristwatches, but it’s also a resource that tells me the
functional story of its origins. It tells me that this was
designed as a pilot’s instrument watch. But it also tells the
story of years and years and years of experience, of this
watch in the cockpit, that have gone into this particular
design. In the end, that speaks about the freedom of flying,
the dream of flying, that adventure is the hero’s story. So you
carry both with you the engineering model — the movement
in the watches, the cases and finishing — but also that
emotional value of the story.
You had a personal hand in the development of the two
new and refreshed stores in Singapore. What’s in the
latest update?
So this space really combines elements of storytelling
with a warm and welcoming atmosphere, where we try to
offer different settings in which to interact with our staff,
everything from a very, very comfortable lounge where it’s
more about socializing space, to a more formal sit-down
and over-the-counter situation that some clients prefer.
We’re trying to make sure that we really have a good balance
between storytelling and a focus on products. And we give an
experience that goes further than just what is in the display
case. Basically, we’re decorating that all the way up to our
flagship concept, where in our flagship stores, we’re going
very, very specific to the location. So the architecture’s
different from one place to another, and they’re also
completely different in their storytelling. The watch content
of the stores is consistent globally. But on the other hand,
you will have storytelling that is fully immersive, that is
individual, to really create destinations that our clients can
travel to, and see a different facet of the brand. To have a
different chapter of the book to experience, so to speak.
When you say immersive storytelling, you’re referring to
physical immersion in the environment, or technological?
I’m talking about a way to make that story really selfexplanatory,
for people to walk in and feel what it is we’re
talking about. That is really inspired by what we’ve learned
from our events. For example, when I look at the Silver
Spitfire take-off event [held at Goodwood Aerodrome to
mark the start of IWC’s Silver Spitfire — The Longest Flight
expedition in 2019], we brought together the engineering
models of the Spitfire racing cars with the watches, and
the engineers, the watchmakers, the drivers. And our civil
Spitfire pilot, Steve Brooks, who’s also racing and you can
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