“In the month of April, about 80 per cent of our stores were closed worldwide, and on the production side, we had some disruption, because all our logistics centres and manufacturing were locked down from end March to end April. However, I think having the disruption on both sides, you have a natural balance in a way,” says president and CEO of Cartier International Cyrille Vigneron.

One of the things that the brand noticed was that desirability was still very strong among their clients and that the trend for more experiential luxury had moved back to an interest in tangible products for special occasions.

“We saw that people were coming back even more to us and saying, how can I get this product for my mother's birthday or for my best friend or my children, and how can I ship it that to them in another country?” says Vigneron.

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As the lockdowns gradually ease and retail shops reopen, Vigneron says it is important for the brand to be versatile and adaptable. “We’re still in the middle of the pandemic so it’s hard to predict what will happen. When a massive change like this comes, behaviours can change even in the long term. So we have to work on plans and we have to work on them in a very, very humble and pragmatic way,” he says.

He sees the way forward as a hybrid between e-commerce and brick-and-mortar stores, a strategy he has spearheaded since before the pandemic hit. Besides creating unique experiences with exclusive salons in their flagship stores around the world, Cartier – owned by the Richemont Group which has seen sales plunge by 18 per cent in the last quarter and is expecting a 67 per cent drop in revenue for the 2020 fiscal – became the first luxury brand in the group to have a stand-alone flagship store on the Alibaba-owned TMall’s Luxury Pavilion (Alibaba is the owner of the South China Morning Post).

“You basically have 1.4 billion people [in China] and Tmall, Weibo and Alipay are ways to interact and connect to everyone in different tier 1, tier 2 or tier 3 cities. So we were the first in the luxury world to go there and it’s proving very successful and I think there are more who want to come [on board].”

Vigneron does not foresee a near future where digital efforts will cancel out the store experience altogether. Instead, he sees more of a hybrid way of connecting with his clients. “It can be a popup, a hybrid, then something digital. It can be also something that starts in the store and you don't find it because not all the collection may be available. You can order it, and it can be shipped to your home through an e-commerce platform, or you see it in one city and you want to ship to your daughter who is in a different city,” says Vigneron.

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Product delivery is not the only strategy that is being rethought at Cartier. The brand has also redefined its focus on collections in recent years, a far cry from when the maison was introducing upwards of 130 new novelties at the annual Salon International de la Haute Horlogerie (now known as Watches & Wonders).

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“About four years ago we were asking not just our own teams, but also outside people and the press, how many watches they remembered from the previous year? And everyone basically remembered one watch per brand. I think people are getting tired of seeing something new that doesn’t really look all that new and what they need more of these days is distinctiveness; things are truly beautiful but are distinctive and identifiable,” says Vigneron.

While unique bespoke pieces will always be in demand from serious watch aficionados, Vigneron says he is seeing clients looking for little touches of personalisation, among which are engravings or even quick-change leather straps.

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“The meaning is not to have something absolutely different from everyone else’s, but something that can be identified as yours. People still want to bond with each other and they just want some sign that acknowledges who they are. We’ve always done that with rings and engagement [jewellery]. It’s just extending it to another product category.”

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