The tribulations of a fine watch making freelancer

The expert’s view

Urs Ryser in his workshop in San Anselmo, north of San Francisco

RK 750 Deco - Royal Diamond © RK Ryser Kentfield

RK 650 Deco Skeleton © RK Ryser Kentfield

Set up in business in California for more than 20 years, Swiss watchmaker Urs Ryser relates the challenges of independence.

Katja Schaer

A career made of tourbillons, major brands, complications, precious moments as well as challenges. That’s Urs Ryser’s story, a story that tells another: that of "Swiss Made" and little independent watchmakers.

Born in 1961 Urs Ryser comes from Bienne. A watch making capital in which he spent all his years at school. But his dreams as a teenager had very little to do with watches. "I wanted to be a pilot, he explains today, amused, but I had glasses and then I had to do my military service first. It was complicated." Complications that led him, whether he liked it or not, to enrol with the district Technicum as recommended by his father, where he spent four years in the micro technical section. It was there that he discovered the art of watch making, a bit by accident. A bit by default even as he says himself: "watch making wasn’t my first passion. It became it."

A word for word apprenticeship

While the subject fascinated him and while he enjoyed the practical lessons, the art of watch making apprenticeship had its ups and downs. "Part of the lessons was given in French, while I only spoke German Swiss." So, assiduous, the student undertook to copy word for word, letter by letter, those phrases he didn’t understand and that his brother, 17 years older than him and married to a French-speaking Swiss, fastidiously translated until the student was ready for his exams.

With his diploma under his belt and just turned 20, Urs Ryser entered the job market. The experience quickly dampened his enthusiasm. "The watch making industry was doing very badly and the competition from Japanese models in particular was making itself felt. It was extremely difficult to land a job." Difficult, but not impossible as the young man was hired as a repairer by Rado, in Langnau, close to Bienne before being in charge of training foreign trainees in English. "We had Indians and people from the Middle East coming to be trained for Rado’s after-sales service in their country," he remembers.

But he was dying to be elsewhere. Conciliatory, the Rado Company offered him a position in New York in one of the service centres. An offer that Urs Ryser rejected because he was tempted by the big apple, too urban, and because it was the Pacific coast of the United States of America that he lusted after. "And my brother was already in California."

Oranges into semi-conductors

So at the age of 23 the young man risked all: leaving with "nothing at all" and for his older brother’s settee for last-ditch security. Urs Ryser settled in San Anselmo, an hour north of San Francisco. That was in 1984. He’s still in the region more than twenty years later. Three weeks after arriving in California, the watchmaker landed his first job. Nothing very technical, all kinds of repairs on all sorts of watches, more by necessity than anything else and for such a laid-back employer that the shop, open at irregular hours, struggled to make money.

So the young Swiss started canvassing, working with a few jewellers specialised in luxury watches and built up a network. "You couldn’t do the same thing today" he says. Until a time in 1993 when he decided to create his own little company through careful investments, limited expenses, small savings and situated in Kentfield, still in the same region, barely an hour from San Francisco. "My shop", as he likes to say… And he made himself known. A few ads were enough, "quite simply in the Yellow Pages" he says. And the clientele had faith, all the more so as California and its Silicon Valley were enjoying a flourishing economy. A time when "rather than pick oranges, people were betting on semi-conductors" he laughs.

An increasingly difficult everyday life

There were difficulties too. Urs Ryser was aware of the growing competition of service centres of major brands. And it was hard he says, because it became increasingly difficult to obtain spare parts. "I had the impression that in the past ten to fifteen years, the major brands are working with small freelancers less and less, preferring to carry out repairs themselves in their own service centres. Customers consequently have less choice in terms of watchmakers capable of maintaining and repairing their watches." Not to mention that freelancers incomes are a long way from being secured.

This is why Urs Ryser chose to create his own watches; a way of getting by while keeping his independence. "And also to have fun because I like creating my own complications." Gold and silver models the crafting of which doesn’t require sophisticated machines, bearing the name Ryser Kentfield "because pieces traditionally bear the name of the person that makes them and the place where they are manufactured" and because putting the name of a small part of California on products made by a Swiss professional amuses him.

However the aim of Urs Ryser’s watches, which sell for between 1,200 and 12,000 dollars for a diamond model, isn’t to rival the prestige of the big names. Furthermore, the watchmaker always works on models by the top names. Models by Rolex, Audemars Piguet, Patek Philippe or Cartier are still part of his everyday life. "My pieces are a way of ensuring a basic income by doing what I love. And they allow me to remain independent, although the situation of small watchmakers has become a challenge." For Urs Ryser, combining watch-making passion with independence remains essential. ■

www.ryserwatches.com

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