The Federation of the Swiss Watch Industry had good news to share in its latest update on the Swiss Watch exports for July. Swiss Watch exports “grew by 8.3% compared with July 2021, to 2.2 billion francs, the highest monthly result achieved since the record performance of October 2014”.
Very strong volume – and value – increases can be seen in the “other materials” category. Steel watches reigned supreme once again in terms of hard dollars, or rather Swiss Francs. Overall, the change in units is slightly down and the change in value is up indeed.
Always interesting is to have a look at the exports by category, where the categories represent the different price segments. At first glance nothing unusual here, however this time the story seems to have a little silver lining for the affordable watches. Exports of affordable watches have been taking a consistent beating these past few years, linked to the rise of smartwatches. However, lo and behold, watches priced at 200 CHF (export price) recorded their sixth positive month of the year. Do you know what happened six months ago? The MoonSwatch happened.
The strong results are not just isolated to Asia, responsible for more than 35% of the share. “In Europe (+8.0% compared with July 2021), the main markets produced higher than average growth, such as in the United Kingdom (+11.8%), France (+11.5%), Germany (+12.6%) and Italy (+31.3%). The United States (+13.5%) confirmed the slowdown in growth that began in June, while maintaining a very steady momentum.”
With Swiss winter around the corner and a global energy crisis unfolding, these positive months will help fill the treasuries at the brands to help them sail through the – highly likely – winter madness.