A Cartier watch available on Net-a-Porter, an early online retail platform for luxury brands. Photo: Cartier
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https://scmp.com/magazines/style/luxury/article/3104260/cartier-piaget-iwc-jaeger-lecoultre-join-alibabas-tmall Luxury
Cartier, Piaget, IWC, Jaeger-LeCoultre join Alibaba’s Tmall, following LVMH with virtual stores for online customers – how much would you spend on a luxury watch you’d never seen?
Watch brands Patek Philippe and Roger Dubuis try out augmented reality headsets and others add virtual assistants to deepen engagement with demanding customers, while some holdouts, including Rolex, insist technology is not immersive enough yet
One feature of Hublot’s digital extension to its Fifth Avenue, New York, store is the chance to interact remotely with in-store salespeople. Photo: Hublot
When the world shut down early this year due to the Covid-19 pandemic, it seemed like trips to the local watch retailers – and indeed almost any shops – would be impossible. But were they?
Products from the Richemont maisons, such as Cartier and Jaeger-LeCoultre, were already available on various e-commerce platforms. In 2019, Richemont and Alibaba Group formed a strategic partnership with the opening of the Net-a-Porter flagship store on Alibaba’s Tmall Luxury Pavilion. The joint venture put all Richemont-owned watch brands including Cartier, Baume & Mercier, IWC Schaffhausen, Jaeger-LeCoultre, Panerai, Piaget, Roger Dubuis as well as Vacheron Constantin and Montblanc, at the finger tips of affluent Chinese consumers.
Retailers are now taking the experiences offered by their platforms to the next level. In early May, IWC launched its first virtual reality boutique, featuring its Singapore store, enabling an immersive experience with the brand while sitting in the comfort of your own home.
“At a time when virtual connections are more frequent and accessible than physical ones, visitors can now enjoy an IWC experience outside the traditional retail infrastructure,” says Stanislas Rambaud, managing director for IWC Southeast Asia.
IWC’s foray into virtual reality was soon followed by sister brand Piaget, who launched a similar virtual boutique experience just a few weeks later. In both instances, the boutiques use vivid three-dimensional depictions of real-life IWC or Piaget stores, with different areas of the store playing host to watch or jewellery collections from the two brands. The private corner of the IWC virtual boutique contains the year’s Portugieser watch novelties, for instance, while the main atrium of the Piaget virtual store plays host to the Sunlight high jewellery collection.
Virtually the same – visiting a store within a store, illustrating how quickly luxury brands have pivoted to embrace the realities of a post-pandemic world. Photo: IWC
Guests are able to explore the store on their own, engage with a programmed chatbot, or book a private virtual appointment with a brand representative who will take them on a tailored journey through the space. This ability to connect with a person is part of what distinguishes these virtual boutiques from other brand websites or e-commerce platforms.
Of course, this is not the watch world’s first foray into recreating a virtual retail experience for its customers. In 2018, LMVH-owned Hublot launched a new digital technology platform for its Fifth Avenue boutique in New York City that allows buyers to communicate with the brand’s salespeople without physically being in the boutique. According to the brand, the digital experience is virtually identical to an in-person visit to the store – except, perhaps, for the risk of contagion in pandemic times.
These virtual boutiques are attempting to bridge the gap between the traditional in-store experience and regular e-commerce, aiming to elevate the overall digital luxury experience to beyond being just another purchasing platform.
Despite the optimistic sentiment and the ongoing development of new technologies that improve the customer experience, not every player is joining the virtual game. The virtual boutiques all still have one major flaw – save for exceptions for very special clients, customers don’t get to see and touch the actual watch or jewellery pieces before making their purchases.
Exploring the Piaget virtual boutique – never crowded, and everything is always in stock. Photo: Piaget
Many time-honoured names like Rolex still rely on traditional channels to sell their timepieces. Some industry insiders have also expressed reservations about the limitations of e-commerce as a whole, believing it unable to confer even a fraction of the full luxury experience afforded to in-store customers.
“Luxury shopping is not as straightforward as commodity shopping,” said Petronille de Parseval, managing director of Piaget Southeast Asia and Australia. “It is about purchasing an intimate art piece that resonates with your values and personality. Brand inspiration and experience are key. Our customers are highly connected and seek information that is not only accurate, precise and accessible but speaks to them emotionally. It is complicated to have a full brand shopping experience while browsing online.”
Not every brand is on board with the virtual game. Some, like Rolex, still rely on traditional approaches to sell watches. Photo: Rolex
Moreover, understandably, most customers have reservations about purchasing big-ticket items via e-commerce, primarily because the experience of appreciating the fine finish of a guilloche dial or the sparkle of a VVS1 D-flawless diamond in person is key to sealing the purchase deal. And that experience cannot be replaced – yet.
The development of today’s virtual reality boutiques is likely just the first step towards a truly vivid, fully immersive digital experience. Brands such as Roger Dubuis and Patek Philippe have already experimented with using augmented reality headsets to allow for deep dives into the brand’s products. For example, Patek Philippe allowed visitors to assemble a watch movement in virtual reality during its Watch Art Grand Exhibition in Singapore last year – an experience far less easily replicated in real life. If this experience could be delivered to customers on a wider scale, that would truly be impressive.
The launch of the Hublot digital store at their flagship bricks-and-mortar New York store in 2018. Photo: Hublot
Given changing demographics that point towards younger, digitally-native clients, digital touchpoints for luxury brands have become increasingly important. A website and robust social media presence are today seen as the bare minimum – perhaps the virtual reality boutique is just the next level up.
The Covid-19 pandemic acted as catalyst and opportunity for the launch of virtual reality watch boutiques. While the industry has a long way to go in meeting the full demands of customers and delivering the very best of one-on-one service, it has laid a foundation for further innovations towards a truly virtual watch retail ecosystem.