Can a 145-Year-Old Watch Brand Win Over Gen Z? Movado’s CEO Reveals the Strategy

As the watch industry balances centuries-old craftsmanship with a new generation of consumers, Movado Group is looking to keep its iconic brands relevant while expanding its portfolio. Joining us now for more is Ephraim Grinberg, chairman and CEO of Movado Group. Thank you so much for being here, Ephraim. Oh, thank you for having me, Justine. Excited to be here. Of course. Yeah, we're so excited to have you. This is just incredible. Well, Movado is a 145-year-old Swiss watch brand. That's just incredible to keep a brand going for that long and have it be so enduring. How do you keep that heritage relevant to this younger generation that now has smartphones, smartwatches? How do you really keep them coming back? So it's interesting. It's really about sticking to the fundamentals and building, continuing to innovate, design great watches. and watches that can emotionally connect to consumers. But what's really exciting right now is that I always have doubts. I mean, I've now been through millennials, now Gen Z, and thinking, are they going to be in the watch category? And you've always had different ways to tell time, whether it was the clocks in your classroom when I was a kid uh or or cell phones in the early 2000s as people uh started to use them and and um but people have always chosen to to connect uh with time differently um and also with with the accessories that they wear and that really uh make them individuals and um so so um i always have doubts is the next generation uh go going to uh go going to adopt watches and and today um it's really accelerating as a trend that young people in this in in social media in um the way they communicate are talking about watches they're building communities um and and it's really exciting um to see um and they're energizing older generations about the watch category so um yeah and we've had we've had some good momentum this year and and i think that's partially uh due to younger consumers uh particularly um young men and young women so um coming back into into uh traditional analog watches yeah it really is incredible to see with so many you know smart watches smartphones and this kind of uh change that maybe people don't need the watch to be able to know what time it is but still want the watch for that accessory look to have that original connection to a real time piece something crafted and especially crafted like Movado's watches you have mechanical watches you have all this traditional watch making at play here you have all of these different types of watches how do you balance the innovation and modern design with protecting the heritage and identity that really made Movado so distinctive from the beginning well I think it's it's it's a really having 145 year history of innovation so Movado throughout its history has had major um phases of of design innovation and technology innovation uh particularly on on the movement side um one of one of the first uh companies to build automatic self-winding mechanical movements uh one of the first companies to adopt um uh the chronograph and then automatic chronographs with the very early automatic chronographs in in the early 1970s um and then one of the first companies to adopt quartz watches as well and we believe there's still a place for all of those technologies and today they're much more current um than they were um a hundred years ago but um and and design is something that actually becomes somewhat cyclical um and so when we talk about innovation it's maybe going back into our archives from the 60s and 70s and and uh bringing back smaller watches for men and for women bringing back shapes like tanks like rectangles and ovals that were very vibrant in the 60s and 70s and and the consumer has responded to um to uh that that kind of innovation that has that is rooted in in heritage yeah it really is interesting to think about the evolution of watchmaking and where the watches started maybe 145 years ago where they are today and also this kind of cyclical nature again going back to some of those classic designs. Thinking about your kind of portfolio, I mean, you've built such a diverse portfolio, includes Coach, Hugo Boss, Lacoste, Tommy Hilfiger, Calvin Klein, all of these big names that so many of us know. What does that brand diversity really allow you to do in today's watch market? So what it really does is that, one, we can make watches at different price points for different consumers and on a global basis, because many of these brands have markets that they're particularly um strong in and and they're all significant brands that we have serious partnerships with for for a long time and um so we get really close to to the companies and the brands and the designers and and are able to to really um develop products that truly fit both in watches and jewelry, into those brands' DNA. But as we've seen the younger consumer return in real strength into the watch category, they're also returning into the fashion watch category, which is more accessible at price points that they can afford. and where they can get also products that are right on the current trends. So I love to tell the story of a focus group that we did about three years ago in suburban New Jersey with young men. And it was really about understanding our Gen Z consumers going to be in the watch category and they were enthusiastic about the watch category. But the thing that really made me understand them and their needs as I was watching this focus group was that these were young men who would not really know the difference between a meter and a yard or a meter and a foot. But all of them unanimously said, well, we want to buy watches that are 35 to 38 millimeters Because that's what they were learning about on sites like Instagram or Reddit or TikTok. And they kind of knew that. So they had a vision of what a 36, 37, 38 millimeter watch. And it's a few years ago, we were selling 42 to 44 millimeter watches. Today, predominantly, we're selling watches below 40 millimeters for men. Yeah, it's just fascinating to think about all of the changes and what people actually want now and what they're looking for in the future. I mean, thinking about the fact that you're leading a publicly traded company that's remained family owned for generations, and you also now have the third generation of the family, right, coming in. Tell us a little bit more about how you kind of make business decisions with that family perspective in mind, and then also what the next generation of leadership looks like as you move into the future here. So, you know, our perspective is to run a company for the long term and being public has enabled us to have an incredibly strong balance sheet and be able to mitigate changes in the environment from an economic point of view and from a disruption point of view and be able to navigate those times effectively well. And as a family controlled public company, we're able to plan for the long term and invest for the long term and get through challenges by doing the right thing for the business. And that's all really what it's all about for us, for me and my team. it's it's about doing the right thing and the healthy thing for the business understanding that you know uh we certainly want to be here in a year or two but we also want to be here in 10 20 and 30 years um and you know so it's exciting to me to have um my daughter in the business um and um and running the Movado brand now as well as a number of our digital businesses So she's been here now for 10 years and it's great to see her grow in the company as well. Yeah, it's just incredible to think about the legacy that you have there. Congratulations on 145 years and good luck with everything moving forward into the next 145. Ephraim Grinberg, Chairman and CEO of Movado Group. Thank you so much for being here today. Thank you very much, Justine.