Fears, a historic British watch brand revived last year after closing its doors in the 1950s, has exceeded sales expectations in the first two months of trading.
The brand was officially re-launched at SalonQP in November by Nicholas Bowman-Scargill, the original founder’s great-great-great-grandson.
“The first two months of trading have beaten our expectations by quite a large margin,” Mr Bowman-Scargill tells WatchPro.
“We’ve actually achieved our sales target for most of 2017 before this Christmas,” he adds.
As well as selling via its own website, Fears has also secured agreements with three retailers: Page & Cooper, a specialist in niche and hard to find brands; OWL, a menswear store in Harrogate; and Lassco Ropewalk, a craft market in London Bridge.
Mr Bowman-Scargill is proving to be a one man marketing machine, securing a spot on BBC Business Live (interview starts 15 minutes in) this week, during which he described the history of the 170 year old family business, and the entrepreneurial spirit he has needed to revive it.
That sort of publicity is likely to catch the eye of additional stockists, Mr Bowman-Scargill hopes, as he looks forward to the new year.
“It’s certainly going to be an exciting 2017 for the industry as we see if the fall in Swiss exports has actually bottomed out, which of course you never know until it actually has. There is certainly a lot of interest in the British watch industry,” he concludes.
