The art of being unique
Cartier
Tagline
Net Worth
$15,000,000,000
Started in (City)
Paris
Started in (Country)
France
Incorporation Date
01st December, 1847
Bankruptcy Date
-
Founders
- Louis-François Cartier
About
Cartier International SNC, or simply Cartier, is a French luxury goods conglomerate that designs, manufactures, distributes, and sells jewelry and watches. The company maintains its headquarters in Paris, although it is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Swiss Richemont Group. Cartier operates more than 200 stores in 125 countries, with three Temples (Historical Maison) in London, New York, and Paris.
Cartier is regarded as one of the most prestigious jewelry manufacturers in the world. It is ranked by Forbes as the world's 59th most valuable brand, in 2018. King Edward VII of Great Britain referred to Cartier as "the jeweller of kings and the king of jewellers." For his coronation in 1902, Edward VII ordered 27 tiaras and issued a royal warrant to Cartier in 1904. Similar warrants soon followed from the courts of Spain, Portugal, Russia, and the House of Orleans. Cartier has a long history of sales to royalty.
Beginning
Louis-François Cartier founded Cartier in Paris, France in 1847 when he took over the workshop of his master, Adolphe Picard. In 1874, Louis-François’ son Alfred Cartier took over the company, but it was Alfred’s sons Louis, Pierre, and Jacques who established the brand name worldwide. Louis ran the Paris branch, moving to the Rue de la Paix in 1899. He was responsible for some of the company’s most celebrated designs, like the mystery clocks (a type of clock with a transparent dial and so named because its mechanism is hidden, fashionable wristwatches, and exotic orientalist Art Deco designs, including the colorful "Tutti Frutti" jewels.
Cartier is known for also its exquisite jewelry is not just a watchmaker, its competing brands on the other hand predominantly watch brands. Fake imitations have hurt the brand in the past.
Cartier not only manufactures –watches and jewelry, but also a host of eyewear, leather goods, and accessories for special occasions. Although it was started in 1847 in Paris, it was not until Louis Cartier’s grandsons Louis, Pierre, and Jacques took over the business, that it became a multinational, with operations in Paris, London, and New York. It was only in 1899 that the company moved to its present-day headquarters at 13, Rue de la Paix. Started by a single owner, it went on to become a multinational, thanks to the efforts of Louis, Pierre, and Jacques, its third-generation inheritors. These people started their operations in London, New York, and Paris turning it into a multi-national.
Cartier Monde, one of the most revered names in jewelry, is also the world’s largest luxury jeweler, which operates almost 200 retail stores located in 125 countries the world over. Although the name Cartier has become synonymous with exquisite jewelry and exclusive wristwatches, the company has also developed a robust portfolio of wholesale items like cigarette lighters, scarves, etc. These low-priced, items are sold at Cartier exclusive stores and at third-party retailers, which account for more than two-thirds of Cartier sales. Due to its exclusive product line, it became the favorite brand of aristocrats.
Road to Success
In 1907, Cartier signed a contract with Edmond Jaeger, who agreed to exclusively supply the movements for Cartier watches. Among the Cartier team was Charles Jacqueau, who joined Louis Cartier in 1909 for the rest of his life, and Jeanne Toussaint, who was Director of Fine Jewellery from 1933.
On the other hand, Pierre Cartier established the New York City branch in 1909, moving in 1917 to 653 Fifth Avenue, the Neo-Renaissance mansion of Morton Freeman Plant (son of railroad tycoon Henry B. Plant) and designed by architect C.P.H. Gilbert. Cartier bought it from the Plants in exchange for $100 in cash and a double-stranded natural pearl necklace valued at the time at $1 million. By this time, Cartier had branches in London, New York, and St. Petersburg and was quickly becoming one of the most successful watch companies in the world.
Designed by Louis Cartier, the Tank watch model was introduced in 1919 with a design inspired by the newly introduced tanks on the Western Front in World War I. In the early 1920s, Cartier formed a joint-stock company with Edward Jaeger (of Jaeger-LeCoultre) to produce movements solely for Cartier. Cartier continued to use movements from other makers: Vacheron Constantin, Audemars Piguet, Movado, and LeCoultre. It was also during this period that Cartier began adding its own reference numbers to the watches it sold, usually by stamping a four-digit code on the underside of a lug. Jacques took charge of the London operation and eventually moved to the current address at New Bond Street.
After the death of Pierre in 1964, Jean-Jacques Cartier (Jacques’s son), Claude Cartier (Louis’s son), and Marion Claudelle (Pierre’s daughter) — who respectively headed the Cartier affiliates in London, New York, and Paris — sold the businesses.
In 1994, the Cartier Foundation moved to the Rive Gauche and opened headquarters in a building designed for it by Jean Nouvel. The next year, a major exhibition of the Cartier Antique Collection was held in Asia. In 1996, the Lausanne Hermitage Foundation in Switzerland exhibited "Splendours of the Jewellery", presenting a hundred and fifty years of products by Cartier.
In 2012, Cartier was owned, through Richemont, by the South African Rupert family, and Elle Pagels, a 24-year-old granddaughter of Pierre Cartier.
Cartier, in 2012, announced the international release of its three-and-a-half-minute film “L’Odyssee de Cartier, which showed its 165-year history, right from its formation in the year 1847 to today. This film traced its path right from the year 1847 when it was formed, through 1899, when it moved to its present-day headquarters, to 1905, when it was nominated as the official purveyor of King Carlos I of Portugal, to 2005, when Cartier co-founded the Council for responsible jewelry practices. All through these years, its stress was on delighting the customer and gaining their patronage.
Cartier can be said to be a socially aware company as it established a council for responsible jewelry practices in the year 2005. Along with this, it made sure that its commitments, which were distributed into three main heads namely: business ethics, social performance, and environmental performance, were all fulfilled in good time. Right from the time of its inception, in 1847, Cartier products are designed to be timeless. Each Cartier creation represents an event or a moment, which is special in itself.
The world’s biggest jewelry and watch brand in terms of combined sales generates more than two-thirds of profits for Swiss parent Richemont, but watch revenues have dwindled relentlessly while jewelry sales have boomed.
Challenges
In 1904, the Brazilian pioneer aviator, Alberto Santos-Dumont complained to his friend Louis Cartier of the unreliability and impracticality of using pocket watches while flying. Cartier designed a flat wristwatch with a distinctive square bezel. This watch was favored not only by Santos-Dumont himself but also by many other customers. The "Santos" watch was Cartier’s first men’s wristwatch.
Like other high-end watchmakers, Cartier is suffering from a drop in demand in big markets such as Hong Kong, Mainland China, Russia, and the United States. But some of Cartier’s problems are specific to the brand, setting up a challenge for Cyrille Vigneron when he takes over the leadership.
Improving Cartier’s image as a watchmaker in China, where wealthy women love its red boxes but men prefer pure watch brands such as Rolex, Patek Philippe, or Vacheron Constantin, maybe top of his to-do list.
“For men, first-time luxury watch buyers will choose to buy Rolex, which is practical and good looking.”
Cartier and Richemont declined to comment on the brand’s strategy to improve watch sales. Richemont said last month that watch sales were down mid-single digits in the six months to September, dragged down by its biggest markets, Hong Kong and the United States. It had already started a similar decline for Cartier watches in the full year to March. Shares have fallen over 12 percent this year. Comparisons with competitors are hard to make. Rolex is privately owned and at LVMH, watch and jewelry sales rose 10 percent during the first nine months but it does not give a separate watch figure. Swatch Group shares have fallen 18 percent, partly due to competition from smartwatches and the drop in demand from China. Watch exports from Switzerland, where Cartier and other watches are made, fell 3.2 percent during the first ten months of 2015 with shipments to Hong Kong down 22.7 percent and rising just 0.1 percent to the United States.
Cartier is suffering from a drop in demand in big markets such as Hong Kong, China, Russia, and the United States.
Some analysts estimate that the high-end watch market in China is down 60 percent since its 2012 peak, partly due to the government’s crackdown on the tradition of gifts-for-favors, which often involved watches. The strong franc has also made Swiss exports more expensive.
Exane BNP Paribas analyst Luca Solca said Cartier also "has not been the strongest innovator in recent years".
Many of its new watches have been based on existing versions, with innovation focused on the most expensive models.
In January, it unveiled its first new model in eight years, the Cle watch. The company is also a relative newcomer in "in-house" watch movements, the mechanisms that make a watch tick, and are beloved of collectors.
While Omega’s name is omnipresent at the Olympic Games and each new James Bond movie, and Rolex cultivates its image as a sports brand, Cartier relies on its signature panther and other more traditional attributes.
Competitors are Breguet, TAG Heuer, Rolex, Omega, Longines, Rado, Tissot, Hublot, Tiffany and Co, Bulgari, De Beers, Blue Nile, Swarovski Crystal, Nakshatra, Chopard.
Failures
Cartier also had lots of challenges. Such as the time when his companions had gotten scurvy during one of his voyages. The scurvy had killed 25 of his crew members. Also on his second voyage, he had taken hostages, Donnaconna (the chief), 4 children, two sons of Donnacona that had gone to France previously, and another Iroquois. All of them had died except for one little girl. When the Iroquois had heard this, they were no longer friendly to Cartier, 35 of his crew members were killed by the Iroquois but there was no war. Cartier had found gold and diamonds but they were worthless.
Achievements
- Cartier on the Forbes World's most valuable list (2017, 2018, 2019)
- The Cartier Women Initiative Awards to encourage women entrepreneurs.
Subsidies
- Swiss Richemont Group
CEOs
- Stanislas de Quercize
- The Cartier Women Initiative Awards to encourage women entrepreneurs.'x