Chatting with Gino Macaluso: Girard-Perregaux Vision

PeterCDE · 2007-12-23T02:39:21Z

An exclusive interview with Dr. Luigi "Gino" Macaluso, CEO of Girard-Perregaux, discussing his vision, passion, and the future of the brand. Discover insights from a true industry champion.

Dear enthusiasts,

those who follow us for a while may already noticed a small number of interviews with Dr. Luigi "Gino" Macaluso.
I´m aware Dr. Macaluso does not need a thorough introduction in this place, therefore i´ll safe you from many words.
But it´s only likewise rare to hear his thoughts and points of view, the more so during a casual opportunity to sit down and have a talk about the brands, the watches and, not the least, the man himself.

(Dr. Macaluso, President of AIHH, 2004)

That´s due to Gino being a most successfull entrepreneur; but he´s not just a "business person". Dr. Macaluso is much more the synonym of a classic gentleman, an impressive person and for sure someone who is able to look back at a set of most unique experiences gathered in so very different fields. Dr. Macaluso is a champion in all he does; an architect by education and one with university laurels, a very successfull race driver and development staff member on side of Italy´s most important car manufacturer, still today President of the italian Car Racing Association, part of the italian "America´s Cup" team then and of course CEO of one of the hottest swiss watch brands.

(Dr. Macaluso with Christian Pfeiffer-Belli, SIHH 2006)

But Gino is among the most humble persons i´ve ever encountered.
Despite his great success in private and business life, as a gentleman with soft and deep voice it´s what he does and says. He is, in some way, "unflashy" - an attitude one doesn´t happen to meet very often in an industry devoted to luxury items. Nonetheless, whatever and whereever Gino is to meet retailers, customers or press, one needs to be prepared for a most impressive encounter.

The chance to do so happened earlier, therefore i´m quite late to share these insights; nonetheless, you may get the idea of the "spirit" of Girard-Perregaux and Jeanrichard, two of the last privately owned watch brands in the swiss watch industry.
They are owned by a real gentleman.
And a gentleman with a clear vision, the will to turn visions into reality and to do this, as we´re near on closing the books for 2007, obviously with overwhelming success.

(Macaluso family)

It´s my very pleasure to share this conversation and beyond the news or details on current and future projects at our cherished brands, you may find one more reason to appreciate wearing a true gentleman´s watch with a Girard-Perregaux timepiece on your wrist.

Greetings from Germany,

Peter

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(BMW Individual "For Girard-Perregaux")

PC: To start with, can you share a bit of background on the BMW - inspired by movement - car?

LM: This car represents passion and skills, something BMW and Girard-Perregaux have in common.

Of course, being the 760 LI, it is the top-of-the class in terms of BMW product today. But it is also much more than that as this version comes with details never realized by BMW before. As an example, the wenge wood used for the inside is very difficult to work on as a material never employed by the automotive industry and the watch compartment is a new feature as well.

It is a very special car, designed for people who understand our culture at Girard-Perregaux.

While it may appear as being simple, it is a highly complex creation. And it stems from a totally emotional base - the outcome is far more than just the sum of the parts.

PC: Car brands doing a car for a watch brand is very rare, particularly if not within an ongoing relationship.
Can you tell us how it came for the project to happen?

LM: BMW approached us and we agreed on a common project that would bring together our respective know-how and culture.

PC: Girard-Perregaux is no stranger to the car world, given the relation with Ferrari since 1994?

LM: We do not offer co-branded watches related to car brands since the end of our partnership with Ferrari and the BMW car is not a project in this regard.

I have to underline that even the cooperation with Ferrari was not inspired by marketing plans back then.

It started as an intellectual project, a cooperation founded on personal friendship particularly with Piero Ferrari, Luca De Montezemolo and later, Jean Todt.

My idea was to translate my passion for Ferrari into a watch - and I did so without having a detailed business plan to apply.

PC: What is the purpose of the car at Girard-Perregaux?

LM: Actually the car is currently not with us, other than for the initial presentation in Gstaad.

It is still with BMW in Munich, where it is exhibited as a show car for "BMW Individual".

We may be able to present the car in upcoming events to be held by local representatives of Girard-Perregaux and BMW in London and Qatar, as well as a common event of BMW and our subsidiary of Girard-Perregaux in Germany.

The car probably will also be exhibited by BMW in the Monte Carlo supercar show ("Top Marques", April 19-22, 2007).

PC: Many voices comment on the "Girard-Perregaux" car by BMW Individual to be the most beautiful of BMW Individual series, due to the subtlety and understated elegance. Will it go into serial production?

LM: We feel honoured (smiles).

So far it is an individual and unique creation, although BMW clients may order such a configuration by BMW Individual.

To our knowledge, no serial production is planned.

As for understatement, the car represents ourselves. It is authentic and not intended to be complicated or "show off"; just the way we are.

(Dr. Macaluso, during an exhibition at Villa Marguerite and GP Museum)

PC: Given your involvement in the development and design of cars during your active career as a Rally Championship driver:´May we get to see more of the culture of Girard-Perregaux in other projects, such as a car body?

LM: Well, car design is not as easy as people may believe (smiles).

Actually it is a very complicated task to do and requires a lot of efforts.

I know, being involved in the design of the Lancia Delta EVO.

(Editor´s note: the Lancia "Delta" debuted in 1979, being under development from 1974, with the "EVO" being the last iteration intended for Rallye which debuted in 1991. The Lancia Delta models dominated the Rally Championship (WRC) with 46 victories overall and six Constructors Championship titles in a row from 1987 to 1992, which is a record unsurpassed).

I am more focussed on watches, since this is what we do.

PC: To touch on a different subject, recently several acquisitions of watch conglomerates taking over brands or suppliers were noted. Some years ago, there have been rumours of offers to buy the brand of Girard-Perregaux. Do we have to face Girard-Perregaux becoming a member of a larger group?

LM: We are independent, we are proud of this and there are no changes ahead.

In terms of our facilities, there are no specific plans either, which does not mean we will not add new structures to our group, in case a new integration makes sense.

PC: Being a manufacture requires different skills in many fields. A new field, which is talked about frequently, is the use of high-tech materials such as Silicium. Will we see such in timepieces by Girard-Perregaux?

LM: Yes, we will integrate new technologies.

Some of this will result from a combined research. True "manufactures" (of which – as you know - there are not that many, so they make for a rather exclusive club) combine efforts to develop this technology.

Our aim is to adapt this technology within our culture and values, not for the sake of cutting costs, but to develop Haute Horlogerie products in a meaningful way.

The objective is to enrich watch-making culture with new technologies and not to trivialise it. If, for example, the hairspring is reduced to a simply produced part, it takes away the magic of the watch.

In this, we have to maintain certain traditions.

PC: A promising glimpse at the future. Do you feel a need for such improvements?

LM: One can say within Sowind Group, we never did better any time before.
(Editor’s note: SOWIND is the umbrella holding which includes the brands of JeanRichard and Girard-Perregaux. It is privately owned by the Macaluso family)

But it is our understanding of being a true manufacture and our vision that drives us to constantly improve what we are doing and how we do it.

While certain developments happen in a rather spontaneous way, it is basically every field we want to improve. There are two levels of our work:

First, we are working on base movements with a comprehensive and unique portfolio, the corner stone of our manufacture.

We were happy to share the last outcomes during SIHH 2006 and evolutions are to follow, in more than one detail and functionality.

Second, we are working in the Haute Horlogerie range:

This of course includes new Tourbillons, which will be developed in a meaningful way.

Then we will try to get deeper into the art of creating and crafting minute repeaters, which is a difficult goal to achieve and involves many skills in many instances.

We will incorporate new materials, which are currently under research, like other true players in the watch world.

And we are entertaining research and development in the field of escapements, which is our "Constant Project". Our aim is to create an evolution by a totally new concept, which does not go back to a mechanism already known from the past. This will be completely new and we hope to introduce it in 2009.

(Girard-Perregaux "Tourbillon Under Three Gold Bridges", special ruthenium finish)

PC: Do you understand "manufacture" as a term related to watch movements only?

LM:No, we do understand this in a much wider sense. We have a holistic approach of what is a Manufacture.

We create watches, not movements only. The movement is the heart, but it is not all that makes a watch.

The design, in particular, is equally important; it stands for our strength, our attitude and our passion. And it is a lot of work.

In this, we are pursuing a total concept.

PC: Is there a goal you want to achieve with your brands?

LM: Starting with JeanRichard, we create about 8.000 watches per year.

And we see the maximum production in the region of 30-35.000 watches per year.

For JeanRichard, we do have some very interesting products in the pipeline!

At Girard-Perregaux, today we create about 18.000 watches per year.

This is close to our maximum output of 20.000 units, which is all we can reasonably produce in the way we do them.

To outline our way, we need to improve every day. But we do so in a wise way.

We are not in the search of the world´s fastest tourbillon. We do useful complications and our work in the field of research and development is aimed at things that make sense.

Sometimes we need to break our creativity and put things back in the pipeline, because we are working on many projects and need to allocate our resources wisely.

Without spreading ourselves too thin, there is a variety of very interesting work currently going on. And our vision is not to do watches for today, but 2009 and 2015. It is development and improvement in the long term.

And at Girard-Perregaux, we will not grow for the sake of growth; we have to maintain our culture.

We will not produce 35.000 watches per year. This would be a quantity not in line with our production philosophy and our creation ideals. Ethics and Authenticity are important for us, much more than total numbers.

And the quality of our products is more important as well, so we will not sacrifice this for the sake of an increased output.

To give an example, let´s look at our Three Gold Bridges Tourbillons.
Today back-orders are more than 4 years; this means, without accepting any more orders we will have enough work for the next 4 years to come.

(Dr. Macaluso on the left, with Dominique Fléchon, Ariane Maradan, Willy Schweizer, Stefano Macaluso, Anne Bieler, Andrea Caputo, Massimo Macaluso, Sandrine)