Within weeks of each other, WATCHPRO Salon in London, WatchTime in New York and Dubai Watch Week in the UAE, proved that major shows do not need to take place in Switzerland.
In fact, as we universally shrugged at news of Baselworld’s return being delayed again to 2023, we showed we prefer not to head to Switzerland to stay in awful hotels costing £500 per night and then being charged CHF 15 for a sandwich inside the exhibition.
MB&F founder Max Busser told WATCHPRO that Dubai Watch Week “is the best watch lover event in the world. Period”.
“DWW has also become the gravitational center for a whole generation of watch collectors. They came from everywhere and they all left giddy and happy,” he added.
Great shows are springing up all over the world, but there is still one gaping hole in the calendar next year. With Baselworld not taking place and Watches and Wonders Geneva hosting only 39 exhibitors, there are hundreds of brands without a physical show at which to launch their 2022 collections next spring.
Nothing will be launched between now and April that will come close to the scale of Watches and Wonders, let alone Baselworld in its pomp.
But WATCHPRO is planning an international show in April, and we will be hosting the world’s press and retailers in London.
Details are being worked on as we speak for an event called Festival of Time, which will overlap with the end of Watches and Wonders so that retailers, press, influencers and watch collectors from around the world can hop over from Geneva to enjoy a few days in London and assess the 2022 novelties from around 50 to 100 prestigious brands.
The onus of the event will be very much on the word Festival, with guests to the show treated to entertainment both in and around the event’s venue and across London.
WATCHPRO will be working with concierge services to help visitors with trips to the theatre, football matches, galleries and fine dining restaurants.
The days of turgid trade shows are over. Press and retailers are tired of being treated like cattle.
Much of the watch business today looks and behaves more like the 5-star hospitality sector where customers are treated to incredible service in beautiful spaces.
This is where events need to go as well, and that is what we intend to deliver with Festival of Time in London next April.
Our aim is for Festival of Time to develop into the greatest watch show on earth. We will not get there in our first year, but everything we do in 2022 will demonstrate the concept that watch events need to inform, excite and entertain everybody attending and presenting.
