GENEVA — Bulgari is bolstering its artistic crafts in watchmaking with the expansion of its factory dedicated to cases and dials in Switzerland, inaugurated Thursday.
An 18-month project saw the site grow from 36,600 to more than 47,000 square feet, spread across three floors. In addition to increasing production capacity as well as upgrading industrial equipment and methods, the additional surface makes room for a new workshop dedicated to métiers d’art crafts.
For Bulgari chief executive officer Jean-Christophe Babin, this extension shows that the Roman jeweler “is of course a great jeweler but has become a legitimate, respected actor in watchmaking,” he said during a press conference on site.
Located in Saignelégier, a municipality of 2,600 inhabitants located north of watchmaking epicenter La-Chaux-de-Fond and close to the French border, the Bulgari facility was originally acquired by the brand in 2009. In 2019, it became a hub for “habillage,” or watch exterior components, with the merging of case and dial productions for the Roman jeweler.
It currently employs 130 people, including four specialized in gem-setting, jewelry-making, micro-painting and marquetry using materials such as hard stones and feathers.
This new development is just the latest in investments totaling 500 million Swiss francs, or $563 million, over the past five years by the Roman jeweler’s parent group LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton across Switzerland, said Frédéric Arnault, CEO of the LVMH Watches division.
A model of the Bulgari factory in Saignelégier.
Since the 1999 purchases of Tag Heuer and Zenith, Switzerland has become a “third home of LVMH” after France and Italy, with 16 manufacturing sites for its watchmakers but also for brands such as Dior, Chaumet, Tiffany & Co. and Louis Vuitton’s La Fabrique du Temps.
“We can be proud of what has been done these past 25 years, with a real [intent to pursue] organic development on our houses that has a strong potential in years to come,” he continued.
Arnault did not disclose a figure for upcoming investments in watchmaking for the next three to five years, but outlined a raft of projects across the LVMH Swiss watchmaking portfolio. Those will include expansion plans for the L’Epée clockmaker acquired in June; of Tag Heuer’s main site in La-Chaux-de-Fond as well as its separate casemaking facilty; spending on Hublot, Zenith and La Fabrique du Temps Louis Vuitton, as well as investments in watchmaking schools.
Bulgari will unveil next year an expansion of its watchmaking headquarters in Neuchâtel, currently housing 160 employees dedicated to product development, assembly and after-sales activities. It will become a manufacturing site for key components currently outsourced.
Arnault deflected questions on potential acquisitions of suppliers, saying that the group would direct its investments toward developing its internal know-how in service of its brands through “organic projects investing on developing what we already have.”
Both executives also said that while synergies across the watchmaking division could be tapped into, combining production facilities wasn’t on the cards. The priority remains developing strong identities and know-how for each brand and verticalizing where possible.
To wit, bringing métiers d’art crafts into the expanded Bulgari facility in Saignelégier was part of its strategy of leaning strongly into the upper echelons of luxury, be it in products or branded experiences.
“The acquisition or reinforcement of expertise is, at least for Bulgari, the most important because being a jeweler we are expected to be at the pinnacle of everything we do,” Babin told WWD.
With client expectations on Bulgari watches high due to the division being “the son of a jeweler,” the focus is sharply on elevation and excellence, particularly on movements, before production capacity or additional techniques.
“Capacity is always easy to increase, whereas expertise is something that takes longer to appropriate — unless you buy a supplier,” he said. “But it’s not always a good idea because some suppliers haven’t invested for some time and even if you invest, nothing ensures you will keep the people.”
Watchmaking is not the only domain where the brand is growing its footprint. While 2025 will be a quiet year on the hospitality front, Babin said three projects would be completed in 2026 and the early days of 2027.
There’s a resort in the Maldives, another in Bodrum, Turkey, that will be the Roman jeweler’s first seaside spot in the Mediterranean, and in Miami Beach, where it is restructuring a 1930s property across the city’s W Hotel and near the entrance to the Art Basel Miami fair location.
Looking further, a total of 20 locations are planned within the next 10 years, a footprint designed to “maintain [Bulgari hotels’] strengths and uniqueness,” with hotels sized between 70 and 110 rooms favoring suites and villas, Babin said.
A workshop in the expanded Bulgari case and dial factory in Saignelégier, Switzerland.
Bulgari’s hospitality arm is crucial to a 360-degree approach to forge deeper and stronger ties with its clientele, a key to the continued success of the Roman jeweler.
“It’s a challenge, objectively, to create deep emotion in a rectangle of a few hundred square meters in a mall,” he remarked. “You can always go the extra mile for the client but it’s not really what I would call immersive.”
The success of this approach so far is what afforded him a measure of serenity despite a luxury downturn that has bitten major luxury groups hard.
Babin deemed poor performance in China this year as “something expectable.”
“It’s the first time that a full generation of Chinese are going through a crisis [specific to the country],” he said, noting an ongoing transformation of China’s industrial landscape from manufacturing to other fields and a decline in population among contributing factors to the current consumer reticence to spend.
He contrasted this with European consumers, which have grown resilient throughout cyclical crises since the 2000s and had grown year-on-year in 2024 despite geopolitical turmoil including the war in Ukraine.
That said, purchases leaned increasingly toward higher-ticket items across all categories, owing to a less-impacted high-net-worth customer base that continues to spend. “It’s tougher for companies who are in the lifestyle luxury [segment] as opposed to companies that are clearly luxury,” he said.
While that didn’t mean Bulgari was completely immune to the current travails in luxury, he described the impact as “not violent” thanks to a focus on selling “timeless value.”
“You cannot believe that a bag that you pay $8,000 today will be worth anything in 50 years — it might have emotional value for your daughter but little else,” he said. “A necklace will have emotional plus be valuable. That’s why people keep buying jewelry [and] precious watches.”
