Luxury pre-owned watch specialist Xupes is changing its name to Chrono24 UK a year after the business was acquired by the global watch trading marketplace in 2021.
The change of name coincides with the opening of a new headquarters on the same estate as the existing Xupes offices, studio and workshops.
“We are excited to have a permanent base in the UK for our customers to visit and to identify with Chrono24. The UK remains an important market for us and one which we hope to continue to develop over the next few years. This beautiful barn gives us a new way to connect with our customers and a place to run events to enrich our marketplace and the watch community we’re part of,” says Tim Stracke, CEO of Chrono24.
Even before being acquired, Xupes had outgrown its original converted barn in countryside close to Bishop’s Stortford in Hertfordshire and secured the lease on a larger barn just metres away.
That building has been fitted out to a spectacular level of style and sophistication and even used some Soho Home products.
Joe McKenzie, a co-founder of Xupes and now head of Chrono24 UK, told WATCHPRO that the workshops, alone, cost £1 million to fit.
The Barn by Chrono24, as it is now known, is home to offices, a trading floor, workshops, secure storage and client hospitality spaces for the Chrono24 UK business and a new operation called The Watch Atelier, which will be run by Megan Young, director of service for Xupes.
The Watch Atelier will handle servicing, repairs, refurbishment and authentication for Chrono24 watches and private clients.
According to Mr McKenzie, The Watch Atelier aims to become the biggest independent service centre for watches in the UK.
The Xupes name will not disappear entirely, but be used for the pre-owned handbags and jewellery business that always ran alongside the watches operation, and was carved out from the watch business that Chrono24 acquired.
Xupes is the subject of a Channel 4 fly on the wall reality TV series, which launched earlier this month and is available on the catch-up service.
The filming took place before the change in name to Chrono24 for the watch business.
Xupes had stock worth around £5 million on its balance sheet at the time of the acquisition. Those watches now appear on Chrono24 as ‘owned by Chrono24’.
There is an interesting dynamic between the luxury client-centred approach of Xupes and Chrono24, which is unashamedly a technology company and marketplace that connects millions of buyers and sellers in as friction-less a way as possible.
As Mr McKenzie notes: “Xupes has always been heavily focused on customer service and standing out in an overcrowded market. As the market has professionalised over the past few years, we’ve seen a need to do things in a more personable way, creating community and bringing watch dealers, lovers and collectors together.”
