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Flood of interest engulfs NOA at Baselworld

It has been just 11 years since brothers Nicola and Daniele Andreatta turned their dream of creating their own watch brand into reality.

Having lived and worked around watches for most of their lives, it seemed a natural step for the Andreattas to take the plunge and launch the NOA brand.

The Italian brothers, who grew up dividing their time between Geneva and their home town of Milan, created a company with a camp in both cities. “We are an Italian family and an Italian brand, but our business runs from Balerna in Switzerland, Daniele Adreatta, the company’s COO told WatchPro.com when we met in Baselworld.

NOA, which stands for None of the Above, set out to be unique within the fiercely crowded Swiss luxury watch market.

Their signature design trait is the 3-dimensional watch, where the face is shaped to be deeper in the centre, and the numerals proudly stand out to touch the crystal glass. Different interpretations of this overarching signature are found across the 16.75 collection (named after the year the mainspring is thought to have been invented), which has been refined for a new line of timepieces for 2014.

This year’s 16.75 watches retain all of the classic elements of NOA’s existing line: 100 metre water resistant steel cases, quartz or automatic ETA movements, sapphire crystal glass, screwed down steel crown, and the specially designed NOA inner ring with raised indexes and numerals.

Subtle differences this year are a slight change to the shape of the cases, and changeable straps.

NOA has struggled to break into the UK market until now, but is keen to find the right partner to add to a successful distribution network that includes South America, Japan, along with other Asian and European countries.

It won’t be a high volume business in Britain. NOA produces only 5000 watches per year, with prices ranging from around £600 – £15,000. Many of their watches are produced in very small quantities to appeal to specific customers in different countries.

“It is important to us that we find the right partner in each country. We want to control our growth so that all our customers always receive the right level of service when they buy a NOA product,” stressed Andreatta.

 

 

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