I owe everything to the Swiss watch industry — my livelihood, my passion and the majority of my friends. As someone who’s been around in the luxury watch space for almost a quarter century, I’ve had a unique perspective on the individuals that have quietly played an instrumental role in shaping the industry as we know it today. Amongst them, I count the indomitable doyennes of communications and PR Marine Lemonnier-Brennan of 289 Consulting and Catherine Eberlé-Devaux of Bulgari, the technical genius Carole Forestier-Kasapi who is currently stationed as the movement director of TAG Heuer, and the movement making prodigy that is Valérien Jaquet, founder and owner of Concepto.

But one of the individuals that I find myself most impressed with is my friend Pierre Jacques. Over the course of his own quarter century career in watchmaking, Jacques has worn numerous hats.

First, along with Brice Lechevalier, he founded GMT magazine, one of the very first glossy luxury watch magazines that preceded my own title, Revolution, by a full five years. Then, he became director of the watch industry’s equivalent to the Academy Awards, the Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève (GPHG).

Next, he became manager of the famous Les Ambassadeurs boutique in Geneva, before eventually finding the role he was born for as CEO of De Bethune in 2011. It was there that he played a significant role in shaping what was the wildly libidinous creativity of genius watchmaker Denis Flageollet into a horological narrative that was comprehensible to the watch buying public.

The watch that was born out of their collaboration, the DB28, was the perfect chalice of expression for Flageollet’s aesthetic originality and technical brilliance. It featured all his signature hallmarks from the front-facing proprietary balance wheel and three-dimensional moon phase indicator to mobile lugs and Grade 5 high polished titanium case.

More importantly, it was the first step in Jacques’ approach to compartmentalize the brand’s story into two distinct chapters: the first expressing all of Flageollet’s avant-gardism with the DB28, and the second communicating his love for classic watchmaking with the DB25.

About a year after he joined, De Bethune won the GPHG top prize, the Aiguille d’Or, for the spectacular DB28. At the same time, Jacques began to bring commercial success to De Bethune by traveling the world, communicating the brand’s unique values and breathtaking horological beauty to clients face to face.

Three years later, the momentum swung back in favor of De Bethune and it reached new critical and commercial success. Over the next decade, Jacques and his team, consisting of Jörg Hysek Junior as head of sales and business development and Ouldouze Nadiri as head of PR and communications, would continue to establish De Bethune as one of the most creative and original voices in independent watchmaking.

In May 2021, I felt adequately confident that De Bethune would soon connect with a new generation of customers to write an article headlined, “The Next Big Thing.” To my surprise, in September 2021, it was announced that WatchBox, a company that had revolutionized the secondary market watch business, had acquired a majority stake in De Bethune.

Anyone that doubted the outcome of this new alliance has been proven wrong as this new relationship has enabled De Bethune to ascend to an even higher level of public awareness and extraordinary watchmaking creativity. Throughout all of this (save for two years when he took a hiatus to helm another watch brand), Pierre Jacques has ably guided De Bethune’s destiny.

It gave me great pleasure to sit down with him and learn about the trajectory of his career in the following interview, which I hope will give you strong insight into what I feel are his invaluable contributions to De Bethune and the Swiss watch industry.

You were already a successful entrepreneur as a college student. Can you tell me about this?

As a teenager, my mother was a very free spirit. She would take her children to rock concerts. But things at home were never very stable financially. So from an early age, I learned to be independent. I started in publishing my first year in college. Every Swiss university student receives an organizer, which is a big book that explains all the resources available to them, such as social services, and also explains the key events in their school year. I started this project and specialized in getting advertisers for this organizer. Actually I thought it was a unique opportunity because advertisers know exactly who their target audience is. To have exposure to every single university student in Switzerland was an amazing opportunity to communicate a brand. But that only happened once a year and I needed to feed myself and pay my tuition.

I learned early on that you have no choice but to be self-reliant. So I was sitting in my dorm room trying to think of other opportunities for brands to reach their audience. It was really a matter of necessity for me; my peers were usually supported by their parents but my education was 100 percent self-funded. Then I recalled that each time I was standing in the gent’s bathroom, my eyes were searching the wall in front of me. I thought to myself, what if we placed advertising there at the public restrooms? It’s the great common denominator because everyone needs to use it at some time. This became my first big success in advertising. I created these picture frames for ads above the gent’s bathroom at eye level.

I sold it to brands as “the first page of advertising that you couldn’t flip past.” Soon they were in restaurants, movie theaters, hotels, everywhere in Switzerland, and I counted Club Med and UBS as some of my biggest advertisers. I continued this business all the way through my master’s degree.

You created the watch industry’s first extra large format glossy magazine named GMT. How did this come about?

In March 2000, I created one of the very first watch lifestyle magazines called GMT or Great Magazine of Timepieces with my business partner and great friend Brice Lechevalier. Then, we had the idea to create a large format magazine that was completely different in size to immediately distinguish it so it felt like a coffee-table book. I met Brice when he was in charge of Club Med’s advertising and communications. We became great friends.

So when we got the idea to create this large format magazine, I called him and proposed that we become partners, with me handling the publishing and advertising side of the magazine and him handling everything editorial. We started off and were profitable by our very first issue. At the same time, we were bringing some fun and lifestyle to the watch world which was very conservative, and helping brands connect to a larger audience. Brice and I both had no experience of education in publishing, so we were learning on the job.

We were just young men full of energy and hope. I remember we brought our mock-up to Patek Philippe and Rolex and after we presented to them, they said, “OK, we will take a chance on you,” and I am still to this day incredibly grateful to them as the Kings of the Swiss watch industry.

How did you meet Denis Flageollet and David Zanetta, the co-founders of De Bethune?

I first met Denis Flageollet and David Zanetta when they were working at a brand called L. Leroy. I was always fascinated by Denis and his love for watchmaking history. So when the two of them set up De Bethune in 2002, immediately I wanted to support them even though there was no financial incentive to do so. In 2007, we sold GMT to the Swiss publishing company Edipresse.

I stayed for two years after this to help with the transition, and at the same time, I took charge of the GPHG. After this, I moved to a Swiss retailer named Les Ambassadeurs. Around the same time, David Zanetta approached me to join De Bethune as its CEO. I had to turn him down because I had already accepted the job at Les Ambassadeurs and I really wanted to give this role 100 percent of my energy and focus and not shift too early to something else.

By this time, David has already been in watches for many decades. I think he felt that he wanted someone with a fresh perspective and plenty of energy to run the brand. It was tough because I had grown to love De Bethune and considered it a truly incredible brand with a totally unique aesthetic and some of the most important technical innovations in modern watchmaking, but few people recognized or understood it.

What eventually brought you to De Bethune as its CEO?

Anyway, I continued to work at Les Ambassadeurs but I felt really detached from all the human interaction I love. My job was to manage a team of salespeople, but I was not on the sales floor, which I would have preferred, and I couldn’t get directly involved in sales because I didn’t want to take any potential sales from my team. At some point, I began to imagine my future and I saw myself having a very comfortable life, but not one where I was challenged or that allowed me to be entrepreneurial. I thought, I’m still young, if I want to do something that can have a lasting impact or make a real change, then I should decide now. A few days later, I called De Bethune and accepted the job as their new CEO.

A few weeks after joining, you immediately faced a huge crisis. Can you tell us about this?

I joined the brand as CEO in January [2011] and on March 15, the accounting department called me and said, “Pierre, we have a problem. We don’t have enough money to pay the salaries this month.” At the time, there were a few shareholders from De Bethune and around 30 employees. And I imagined having to tell them we couldn’t pay their salaries. I realized I was never going to let this happen. So I went to see Denis and I asked, “OK, what do we have in our parts inventory? What kind of movement case … anything? How many watches can we assemble as fast as possible?”

In the end, we identified about 20 watches we could assemble. So then I got on the phone and called one of the best clients I had in my network. I told him that in about one month I could deliver him these 20 watches, but I needed half a million Swiss francs right away. I told him this and simply gave him my word. The Swiss watch industry works in this way based on trust. He agreed and sent the money right away. It is the relationships that you make in this industry that are all the difference. To this day we are still friends. It was the half million Swiss francs that I used to start the engine of this beautiful brand to push it in the right direction. The funny thing was, before this crisis, I was uncomfortable in my job as the CEO.

In January and February, I felt I was playing a role, doing things that a CEO should be doing. After this moment where you really look at the potential failure and bankruptcy of your company and you are able to save it from this, I realized I actually am the CEO. So maybe in the end, De Bethune founders gave me a gift or a leadership lesson, because I had to face a crisis in the early age of my career in the company. When I first joined, a lot of people at the manufacture looked at me, like, “What is this guy doing here?” After they understood what I did, they treated me in a way that made me feel I really belonged there. In 2010, the brand made 65 watches; by 2013 and 2014, we made close to 400 watches.

Why was De Bethune facing challenges before you joined?

The reason the brand was having challenges was that there was no one taking care of the relationship with customers. Denis is a creative genius, but he feels the most at home in Sainte-Croix.

He always says, “I’m a watchmaker, I should be at the bench.” What I respected about Denis was, he was always striving for the best, always trying to push quality or performance to the next level.

At the same time, David didn’t really enjoy traveling and meeting people. When he did, sometimes he would get very frustrated if they didn’t understand the brand right away, and he would leave the meeting or walk away from the table. De Bethune at the time was in some ways too pure, meaning too immersed in pure creation, but without any real commercial plan.

What was your plan to help De Bethune and how did you execute it?

It was about clarifying the line. By the time I arrived, De Bethune had spent one full decade creating some truly extraordinary watches [such as] the Dream Watch, the DBS, the DB21, but there was just so much. There were too many references so that the identity of De Bethune was unclear. A brand has to be understandable.

I was a bit frustrated because I knew that Denis was at the same level as someone like François-Paul Journe, yet somehow he was far less known. But to me he had to be part of this special club.

Part of it [the problem De Bethune faced] was the brand was not his name, and part of it was he had always preferred to let his watches speak for him. But even more, the watches had to strongly express a very clear story and embody his key achievements, so that it would be much easier for potential customers to understand. I needed to get Denis to create a watch that everyone could understand and that could showcase his incredible creativity. That watch was the DB28.

I joke a bit because I remember Günter Blümlein created a grande complication based on a Valjoux 7750 ébauche and he called this watch the “Warhorse of Schaffhausen” or Il Destriero Scafusia. We need the “Warhorse of Sainte-Croix” and this was the DB28.

Why do you think this watch won the 2011 GPHG top prize, the Aiguille d’Or?

You look at the watch and you are immediately struck by its originality. It has the movement facing the front, it features these flexible floating lugs and it is made completely from Grade 5 high polished titanium. It is so fantastically original. Then you look at the watch again and you see the signature De Bethune delta-shaped bridge retaining the two barrels, the in-house balance wheel pulsating at the base, and just underneath this, our signature three-dimensional moonphase indicator that is handcrafted from palladium and blued steel.

Add to this two more of Denis’ signature complications, the proprietary De Bethune hairspring with its unique terminal curve and the triple pare-chute anti-shock system, and you have a showcase for Denis’ virtuosity that is easily comprehensible. So when we finally had the right watch, I knew I had to travel the world to show this watch to everyone I knew.

How do you share your roles with Denis Flageollet?

Why do many of the most famous watch brands have two names, like Jaeger-LeCoultre or Vacheron Constantin? Because the brand consisted of two people. The first was the technical genius and the second was the individual that traveled the world, met clients and communicated the value of the watches. Denis was the former and I knew that I was born to the latter job.

What is your relationship with him like personally?

We have been partners and have worked side by side for 15 years now. We are almost like a married couple [laughs]. I’m joking but like a marriage, the most important thing is we have each other’s trust.

How did the idea to sell majority shareholding to 1916 (previously WatchBox) come about?

At the beginning of COVID [the pandemic], we were very worried just like everyone else. Denis and I are both shareholders of the company, but on top of that, we had another 15 shareholders. This can be tough to manage, especially during uncertain times, which we thought COVID would be. They were all good people, but they were all not from the industry and would call us up to suggest things to me all the time.

I saw that some were genuinely concerned at the start of the pandemic. So we decided that we should look to have just one shareholder with a strong strategic advantage rather than 15 different individuals. That’s when I met with WatchBox. I was very impressed with what they had done to support the independent watch market and their role in really boosting secondary market value. They actually helped a lot of smaller brands and are run by very passionate individuals. We structured a deal for WatchBox to take over the shareholding represented by those 15 individuals.

So yes, they are the majority owner of De Bethune. But it’s not like we sold the entire company to them. Denis and I are still part owners. WatchBox, now 1916, took over the shareholding represented by the other 15 people. We work very well together as a team and they’ve done a great job helping us to expand awareness of the brand. For example, the movie about Denis that you were in, called Seeking Perfect, was a really powerful initiative along with a beautiful Assouline book to mark De Bethune 20^th anniversary.

Who manages De Bethune today?

Today De Bethune is led by a triumvirate that consists of Denis as the founder and watchmaking genius, myself as CEO, and Justin Reis as the executive chairman. Justin’s role will be to help us through his international business experience to grow in the right way. He has already created very beautiful De Bethune homes in Los Angeles, New York and Hong Kong. We are working on opening a showroom in Saudi Arabia. He’s based in the U.S. and really focused on the U.S. market. He works closely with American celebrity clients such as Swizz Beatz, tennis player Tommy Paul and artist Wes Lang.

Our joint objective is to reach 600 watches in the next five years as we have our own boutiques now. I am not sure if we will want to grow much more than this. We want to have the highest level of finishing and you can’t go beyond a certain size if you want to keep the quality. It is important to have a kind of entry-level watch, but I also would like us to grow in the high complication and grande complication category, as we did with the Kind of Grande Complication we presented this year.

Describe your relationship with your retail partners.

We are big believers in retail partnerships. We love working with people such as Michael Tay from The Hour Glass in Southeast Asia, and the Seddiqi family in the Middle East. They are amazing brand builders. There are also great people like Leon Adams from Cellini in New York, Art in Time in Monaco, and a few more. I come from a retail background and I really believe in the role of the retailer.

What have you not done yet at De Bethune?

Obviously the one thing we haven’t done yet is the minute repeater. But Denis doesn’t want to be rushed into this. He says that when he makes a striking watch, it will have to be something that brings a new level of performance to the category. We will come with this watch when we are ready.