Luxury is a business model. This has been empirically fine tuned through time by those luxury brands that dominate the pantheon worldwide: Louis Vuitton, Chanel, Gucci, Hermès, Ferrari, Rolex and so on.
The imminent arrival of the Apple Watch and a phalanx of other smartwatches into the global market was the main topic for debate last week at Baselworld – the annual gathering of the watchmaking industry in Switzerland. There were three very different competitive responses from the Swiss brands in attendance at the event.
Considering a luxury brand strategy? Begin with the fundamentals. Luxury brands don’t start with prestige and premium – they begin with a founder who inevitably comes from the middle of society rather than the top. Madam Chanel was an orphan, Guccio Gucci a merchant’s son from Florence – founders are artisans not aristocrats.
