[Watchmaker working in Blancpain store]
[Hands holding mechanics as a machine makes adjustments]
[Blancpain Villeret Traditional Chinese Calendar 2025 watch]
[Exterior of Blancpain watchmakers established in 1735]
[Window display centered on the Fifty Fathoms collection]
[Interior of Blancpain store]
[Window display at Audemars Piguet showing watch mechanics]
[Interior of Gübelin store on Geneva’s Rue de Rhone]
[Door opening at the entrance to the Gübelin store]
[Gübelin’s manager Clement Mercier, entering store]
Clement Mercier (interview): “Christmas time is one of the biggest periods in Geneva. We have about 20 to 30% of the turnover made during that month.”
[Clocks on the wall at Gübelin’s entrance]
Clement Mercier (interview): “First would be Americans, we have USA. We have also South Americans, Brazil. And then we have, of course, more during the summer season, Middle East. And Asia throughout the year.”
[Chanel watches on sale]
[Initium, a shop where one can make a watch]
[Watchmaker Quentin Murer in the workshop]
[Workstation set up for someone to disassemble and reassemble a working movement]
[Choice of watch cases]
[Choice of mechanical movements]
Quentin Murer (interview): “Here the people can buy the opportunity to make their own unique watch, or to learn a little bit more about watchmaking. For example, they can make the initiation course, so they can disassemble and reassemble a working movement. Or they can assemble their own watch, so pick the component, the dial, the hands, the gaze (meaning the style), everything, and then they assemble the watch, and they leave with the watch.”
[Street in Geneva old town with Swiss flags and flags of Geneva Canton]
[Luxury brand shop signs]
[Rolex storefront]
[Zenith watch window display]
[Exterior of Tiffany & Co.]
[Exterior of Jimmy Choo]
[Exterior of Beau Rivage Hotel as chief concierge Raphaël Mathon-Goupil walks in]
Raphaël Mathon-Goupil (interview): “Locally, when you have this expertise, you can send them to one of your friends, for sure, knowing exactly what is looking the guest (what the guest is looking for), and sometimes you can maybe share, okay, this guest’s preferred champagne is this. When a guest is coming, welcoming him by his name, maybe a glass of champagne, with his favourite champagne, and maybe also to this store, the guest will ask us to find for this specific item, the preferred items will be already organised in a private salon.”
[Mathon-Goupil working on reception]
Raphaël Mathon-Goupil (interview): “We can call a contact, a manager, someone in the boutique, and to have a look, can you open this store, can you just bring me this, it’s 10 p.m. Or sometimes the guest is leaving at 7 a.m. for the flight, ‘I know you’re opening at 9 a.m. but can you do something magic for me?’ We can do that.”
[Exterior of Caviar House and Prunier retail outlet]
[Interior of store with Christmas trees and caviar cold room]
[Caviar selection]
Cyril Baron (interview): “For Christmas, we have almost 60% of the yearly sales in December, which is quite massive, so we need to be ready.”
[Tins of caviar]
Cyril Baron (interview): “Our brand is quite the most expensive brand, but we will go from a small caviar tin, kind of caviar shot, from 10 grams, will cost 20 Swiss francs, and we will go to a special caviar like Almas, 1 percent of the worldwide production, a white caviar, will go to 20,000 (Swiss francs) for one kilo of caviar.”
[Caviar]
[Favarger chocolate store where one can make a chocolate bar]
[Geneva]
This script was provided by The Associated Press.