Philippe Léopold-Metzger, CEO of Piaget: At Piaget, after-sales service is part and parcel of customer service, a function that used to belong to our Marketing department and which now comes under Senior Management. Customer service is essential to what a brand is and must be. Our head of customer service always attends product development meetings with the ongoing objective of building quality. Should he be opposed to one or other aspect of the product, we would have to take his opinion into account.
Our initial objective is to keep the number of potential product returns to an absolute minimum, i.e. to increase quality. For a brand such as ours, which is committed to manufacturing its movements entirely in-house, this demands the highest standards at every level of production. Piaget’s Quality division in Geneva employs 20 people in addition to one person outside the company who carries out the final quality control in all objectivity prior to delivery. With respect to after-sales service, Piaget also works in synergy with the Richemont Group which has its own quality platform.
Anyone who buys a luxury product buys quality but also, should the need arise, the capacity to repair it. The problem with these new brands is that they often propose complex products that will inevitably require careful maintenance. The question is whether or not they have the financial capacity to propose such a service. At Piaget, we have introduced decentralised after-sales structures to promote our expertise in the field. Only vintage and very complicated watches are dealt with centrally. We aim to be in a position to repair every watch we have ever sold, regardless of when. So far, of the 25,000 or so watches brought to us, in just six cases were we unable to find original solutions, only alternatives. So that we can go on providing this level of expertise, we also keep a stock of parts that will cover our needs for the next 15 to 20 years. In investment terms, this represents some €10 million in tied-up capital. Needless to say, some brands are a million miles from such considerations. This is why I sincerely believe the acid test will come over the next few years.
Our customers are fully aware that when they buy a luxury watch they are purchasing something that will require regular servicing. We explain this to them in “Piaget at your service: how to care for your watches and jewellery,” a short brochure we have had translated into ten languages.