Swiss watch brand HEBE – Horology Elaborated By Experts – is set to make a push into the global watch market in 2012, having received encouraging feedback from consumers and retailers at BaselWorld, having been taken over by investors last year.
The brand is now in a position where it hopes to revive itself, having enjoyed “some glory years” until the 1970s, when it struggled against the rise of quartz watches.
Now HEBE, which was founded in 1901, hope to place itself “on the front scene” and “raise its profile to where it belongs”, following a take-over by new investors in 2011.
At BaselWorld last month it showcased a number of watches including its skeleton timepiece Arrows of Time, said to push the boundaries with the use of “unusual shapes and contemporary colour schemes”.
The brand’s marketing manager Nicolas Monge said: “A few weeks ago, for the brand’s 43rd participation at BaselWorld, we have revealed our new collection which included our latest [watch] Arrows of Time.
“The feedback that we received was overwhelmingly positive and encouraging for us, it did confirm that we were launching the brand in the right direction.”
The brand considers itself an expert in the making of skeleton watches, having worked with the design since it first made pocket watches in the 1920s.
HEBE was founded in 1901 in Alle, a small Swiss village of the Arc Jurassien. In the 1950s it developed a line of diamond wristwatches reflective of the times in the United States, known for being the Golden Age of Hollywood. It continued to export its timepieces to other countries and in 1964 HEBE became one of the first Swiss watchmakers to enter the Chinese market.
