Reply With QuoteAre you "offered" the opportunity to become an entrepreneur - I thought you just went and did it? Look out for a new micro-brand "KERN", 47mm diameter with NH35 movements and a choice of 3 NATO straps lol
https://www.hodinkee.com/articles/ri...ately#comments
I dont like the direction IWC headed under his stewardship, theres nothing in the current collection I would buy other than a Portuguese (I already own one)
Along with throwing lavish gala dinners every other month and inviting celebs from all over the globe to attend and passing the cost on to the consumers through their 3 hander Selltia movement watches costing well over 4k plus along with new models of much bigger case sizes with ghastly designs.
and his Gerald Ratner moment;
http://forum.tz-uk.com/showthread.ph...-cost-of-image
Are you "offered" the opportunity to become an entrepreneur - I thought you just went and did it? Look out for a new micro-brand "KERN", 47mm diameter with NH35 movements and a choice of 3 NATO straps lol
He had a kicking over on instagram:
- thehorophileGood riddance. Marketing is more than just throwing a star-studded red carpet event at any and every occasion.
- juste_jerome@jaboulove
- mikebuchholz1@hodinkee never heard of the man
- patrikljungman1@thehorophile I never really understood why one would spend money on any and every little film festival?
- equationdutempsA great opportunity to reshuffle the corporate governance with a more efficient management structure
- hurtingbombzKern got the burn @domgeiser
- rgd1977Is that Gregg Wallace from Masterchef? 👀🤔
- tiada_apa_apaToo many special editions!!
- dpwilliamsbespokeAgree. Far too many celebrities for IWC.
- yourgentlereminder@georgeskern is such a class gentleman. He stayed with my hotel in Berlin. Love Richemont and IWC!
- bennycharlie1@hodinkee Richemont need a divine miracle -not a new boss. Terrible service, over priced watches of poor quality, crap advertising.
- suavelifeI have a feeling this will not stop the onslaught of celebrity endorsements Richemont has been pushing
He certainly wasn't a Biver (or should that be beaver?)
He wasn't even a Nataf, although he borrowed more than a couple of songs from his hymn sheet.
'Against stupidity, the gods themselves struggle in vain' - Schiller.
As someone tipped for the top, he's either jumping because he's not getting enough power quickly enough and doesn't like the current structure, or wants to leave the sinking ship while the going is good.
He certainly seemed to have his finger on the pulse of the superficial 'bling' culture and an expanding economy during the good times. Inflationary quantitive easing translated into ever inflating watches, expansion into China and watches used as a bribery currency, marketing hype and star studded galas - he had it down. To be honest, it's actually impressive the confidence he has that his grandiose marketing schemes will sell enough products to pay for them. Like it or not he knows what he's doing in that department. The Zurich Minds video quoted below has a feeling of hubris about it, and seeing behind the scenes makes you feel slightly duped, but you can't help admiring his nerve. Too much hype and plus sized showiness though, and a brand ends up feeling superficial and loses the kind of dignity that takes decades to acquire.
It will be interesting to see what he does next. He will probably have his own ideas that he will do in his own way, if he's wasn't allowed to where he was. I guess he knows his audience and how to profit from it.
Jumped:Originally Posted by Itsguy
Update, 06:30 EST: according to Bloomberg, Mr. Kern*" ... bought a stake in rival watchmaker Breitling and plans to help that brand revive itself,
He is rumoured to be running Breitling for CVC. ('Rumoured' as in 'it's all over the Internet'). He will have been given an equity stake and chance to become very rich if/when CVC sell Breitling for a huge profit in a few years.
Wow, smart move. If he can work his magic on a brand that he has a real stake in, he'll make a absolute fortune. And let's face it, Breitling are a good candidate for the treatment.
I fear the moniker Brightbling will never have felt so true soon.
Maybe a good thing for IWC...they were losing their way so hopefully whoever takes over can bring things back to how they should be.
Sent from my iPad using TZ-UK mobile app
And yet, the real opportunity would be in expanding on their more subtle options, like the Transocean. They've gone as far as they can with Navtimers, surely? There are a few others I'd junk pretty quickly, and those wonky bracelets could do with an overhaul too.
Then again, what do I know? I belong to a watch forum and like beautiful and subtle watches, the ways of the Kern are a complete mystery to me... and he's the one with all the cash in the end.
Last edited by Itsguy; 14th July 2017 at 16:35.
I wish him and Breitling all the luck in their new partnership.
Personally I thought his total concentration on developing a celebrity "team" endorsement regime was of great detriment to IWC, a brand that was founded on quiet, understated capability, and not the whopping great ostentation that it has drifted towards.
And his smugness over the creation of his aspirational celeb sales pitch for his "useless" products jarred massively against the traditional narrative of value in skill and craft.
If he follows suit in Breitling, they may indeed become a parody of themselves.
I hope not.
Dave
This guy rode a massively increasing market to some success, I think despite himself. Fortunately Breitling is so poorly managed that he might actually be an improvement.
I have increased hopes for IWC now that the clown prince of marketing is taking his talents elsewhere.
Seriously should anyone care? I wish him well but he was/is no biver - who I wonder what he will do to zenith with the new escapement he is planning to put into production.....
Sent from my E6653 using TZ-UK mobile app
Brilliant move; I've always thought that the one element Breitling lacked to be a major player was outright sneering contempt for its marks customers.
Last edited by Belligero; 16th July 2017 at 22:14.
Yes. After all if ever one brand needed a little injection of bling...Brilliant move; I've always thought that the one element Breitling lacked to be a major player was outright sneering contempt for its marks customers.
'Against stupidity, the gods themselves struggle in vain' - Schiller.
At least people can't blame him for making all their watches enormous and shiny. I think he's an upgrade to whatever ouija board breitling has been using up to now.
Prepare yourself... for the 70mm Navtimer!
Since I've been borderline kind so far about Kern's marketing skills, in the interests of balance I'd like to point out one of his lasting legacies: killing Genta's Jumbo Ingenieur. One of the most famous and treasured watches, mentioned in the same breath as the Royal Oak and Nautilus. Admittedly it never took off in the same way, partly because it was the ugly duckling of the family, and also because the original bracelet wouldn't bend enough to accommodate all but the largest wrists. Nonetheless, IWC were one of the only brands with a historical right to create an authentic competitor to these famous watches. There was nothing too wrong with the models they had, but I guess they weren't selling by the bucketload, and were due for a refresh. Enter Kern.
The first idea was to make them MUCH BIGGER. No matter that they were already large, you can always go larger, right? Secondly, they needed 'a story'. Diving watches, according to Kern, are about pretending to be a diver, pilots' watches about pretending to fly. Pretending to be an engineer doesn't quite cut it. How to bring this to life? What about Forumla 1? Formula 1 is perfect, it's based on engineering, and the drivers and team members always wear huge gaudy watches - it's a match made in heaven! No matter that diving and pilots' watches form a design language going back the best part of a century, while wearing gaudy watches in F1 goes back all of a decade, the main thing is that guys will queue up to pay five figure sums to pretend to be F1 drivers. Men like F1, and F1 is about vulgar oversized displays of wealth. They can even ship F1 cars around the world to make marketing displays!
There are some flaws in this plan, as the sales figures showed. The watches themselves didn't look bad from a distance, but were simply enormous. Even the 40mm version that retained some of Genta's original intent had huge crown guards to fit in with the rest of the collection, while the dials were simplified compared to previous models, to emphasise their status as entry level models. The biggest problem though was the price and the movement. A traditional selling point of the Ingenieur was being antimagnetic, before it was being 'something to do with Formula 1'. The 40mm version contained a Selitta and some anti-magnetic iron, and was priced above Omega's truly anti-magnetic new movements. There was no longer any mention of IWC's in house fettling of stock off the shelf movements either. Apparently the movements were supplied according to IWC's specifications, whatever that might mean.
In the end, perhaps the Jumbo Ingenieur couldn't survive without IWC developing an anti-magnetic movement of their own. But the main issue was that people don't want oversized, overpriced, ugly watches propped up by overblown marketing fantasies. They want beautiful, well engineered watches, possibly with some history behind them. When they didn't sell, IWC killed the jumbo Ingenieur and replaced it with the current horror, when all they needed to do was fix the obvious issues. The 40mm version was by no means a bad watch and will probably become a sought after classic - all they had to do was tinker with the recipe. They could even have brought back the beautiful Vintage Ingenieur in a more wearable size. As it is, the whole range has been replaced by a singularly uninspired new design, and the Jumbo Ingenieur remains a lasting casualty of the age of bling and marketing hubris.
Last edited by Itsguy; 17th July 2017 at 08:14.
Maybe now they're rid of the pseudo-Genta design they will be able to go back to the original Genta design one day
I've always thought it more handsome than the AP and PP Gentas and have always been puzzled by how it came to evolve so much
What a good post Itsguy.
The 3228 was my favorite Inge reference. More wearable than the 3227 but without the cost cutting bland dial of the newer eta clone version.
I think IWCs problem is the constant change. It's hard to refine when you have very little fixed design language. Omega suffers from this as well, though to a lesser extent now than in the recent past.
Iwc actually had an a-magnetic movement many years ago in an Inge. It wasn't reliable so it got... replaced and forgotten about. Missed opportunity to refine - again.
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