Linde Werdelin keeps a comparatively low profile as a British based watch brand these days. That suits Mr Jorg Werdelin, who prefers to delight a loyal cohort of collectors rather than aiming for the more mass appeal of, say, a Bremont. Simon de Burton recalls his earliest impressions of the business and how it has adapted for the modern market.
Ask anyone with more than a passing interest in contemporary watch making to name an independent brand that was established in the UK in 2002, made its first watch in around 2007 and is still going strong today, and the chances are they’ll say Bremont.
But there’s another dial name that also fits those criteria, one that has never garnered the quantity of column inches afforded to Bremont or matched it in terms of growth but has nevertheless remained a constant that continues to attract a global following with its unique, low-volume products.
The brand in question is Linde Werdelin, which was set-up 20 years ago by former banker Jorn Werdelin and accomplished designer Morten Linde, two Danes who had been friends since childhood.
The first article I wrote about Linde Werdelin appeared in the Financial Times on November 13, 2004, a good two years before the firm had made a single watch — but it seemed worthy of a story by dint of the duo’s ambition, which was to produce a luxury mechanical sports watch that doubled as a platform for a series of clip-on computers that Linde Werdelin called ‘Instruments’.
“The detachable screens will be designed on the themes of land, sea and air,” I wrote in my FT article, “and will be capable of recording, holding and providing a range of data from the wearer’s heartbeat to oxygen intake, ambient temperature variations, altitude, weather conditions, speed and even an entire history of the day’s activities.”
That sounds familiar because such features are considered de rigueur for today’s smart watches. But this was 2004, don’t forget, an entire decade before the world was to get even a first glimpse of the prototype Apple Watch on the wrist of CEO Tim Cook during the launch of the iPhone 6.
In the event, Linde Werdelin stopped offering ‘Instruments’ in 2012, both because their cost and complexity made them financially unviable and, according to Mr Werdelin, because only 10% of people who bought a watch also bought an instrument to go with it.
While the idea may not have been long-lived it will (or should) go down in horological history as a valiant attempt to do something really different during an era when mechanical watches — save for the singular creations of Richard Mille, say, or oddities such as HYT — have, by and large, remained distinctly unimaginative.
I was reminded of Linde Werdelin’s surprisingly consistent (yet rarely acknowledged) ability to be first to the party just 10 days after the official outbreak of the war in Ukraine when it revealed the design for its ‘3 Timer Ukraine’ edition. Featuring a dial and strap in the blue and yellow of the country’s flag ( the first such watch to be announced), it is limited to 33 examples and costs £6,600, with all profits going to the British Red Cross Ukraine Crisis Appeal.
So what else has this small independent succeeded in achieving before similar ideas were followed-up by far mightier brands? Well, back in 2016 Mr Werdelin publicly questioned the future relevance of Baselworld and, having taken a stand there every year since 2009, voted with his feet by abandoning the show the following year.
It was in 2016, too, that Linde Werdelin became the first watch brand to establish and promote a certified pre-owned and authentication service and, since it has been selling online from the very beginning, was surely among the first dial names to embrace etailing.
At its growth peak in around 2014, the firm was based out of swish offices in London’s Notting Hill, employed 15 full-time staff and operated a design studio in Denmark. But, as Mr Werdelin explained to Watchpro in a frank and exclusive interview, the watch selling landscape was to change dramatically and suitably drastic decisions had to be taken in order to keep the business afloat.
“As everyone in the industry will remember, 2009 was a tough year as a result of the Lehman Brothers meltdown causing a global financial crash,” he recalls. “But for the watch industry, it didn’t really amount to much more than a tough quarter and then everyone was back on their feet.
“For us, the really crucial moment came in August 2015. I recall it vividly, being at my summer house in Denmark and calling the office to find out how things were going — only to be told that they weren’t. Absolutely nothing was happening. Normally we would be arranging for watches to be packed-up and sent out, but sales had just dried up.”
One of the reasons for the downturn, says Mr Werdelin, was the unexpected explosion in the pre-owned market. “Sales of new watches tanked because people suddenly realised that they could look online and buy a watch that was a few months old for a fraction of its new price — and, because of the Swiss industry’s massive over-production, there were endless offerings to choose from.
“At the time there were very few pre-owned Linde Werdelin watches for sale, simply because we have never been a volume producer. But the variety of other makes and models on the market inevitably diluted the amount of attention we were getting.
“We held a board meeting and realised our revenue was down by 75% — but when we looked at the production pipeline, we were also committed to paying for around 1,000 watches that we had on order.
“To minimise the impact we had to buy back stock from retailers to prevent discounting, then we began to cut away the wholesale operation and focus on direct sales and expand the business with accessories and a pre-owned offering,” recalls Mr Werdelin.
Proof that the strategy worked can be seen in the fact that Linde Werdelin not only survived, but has gone on to thrive as a considerably more streamlined business.
Mr Werdelin and Mr Linde parted company in late 2017 due to the latter’s wish to pursue other ventures, but his basic, original design for Linde Werdelin watches, which was dictated by the need to accommodate those ‘instruments’, was already established and is still echoed in the highly distinctive appearance of each of the five watch families.
“Linde Werdelin runs well now, but in a completely different way to how it did before,” says Mr Werdelin. “Back in the early 2010s I was travelling an enormous amount, spending large amounts of money going around the world meeting journalists, retailers and clients and, of course, committing a considerable amount of revenue to Baselworld. I worked out that the show accounted for up to CHF 400 of the retail price of every watch we sold.
“Now, we are totally focused on taking care of our clients and sell around 150 new watches and perhaps 50 pre-owned a year. We have sold a total of 5,000 watches since the beginning, so we really know our customers and they know us.
“Linde Werdelin has become a brand for collectors and that often means creating unique pieces or doing as much as we can to help people out with what they want to buy. Just recently, for example we took in a 10-year-old Linde Werdelin from an owner who loved it, but just fancied a change.
“Yes, we’re small and we only make watches in small editions of between 33 pieces and 99 – but we have a strong and loyal following and the business is manageable. There’s no need to spend 40 hours a week working on the website, no need to fly around the world for half the year and no need to be available between the middle of December and the middle of January ‘just in case’ – even though it is usually a completely dead period,” concludes Mr Werdelin.
The relentless pursuit of growth is all very good – but we reckon the Linde Werdelin way of running a watch business sounds a whole lot more enjoyable. Long may it continue.
