Swiss watch producer Girard Perregaux expects soaring sales in Taiwan this year, driven by a ramped-up branding campaign and launches of new watch collections, a company representative said yesterday.
"We expect our business revenues in Taiwan this year to show 80 percent growth compared with last year," said Tony Fung (馮子樑), chief executive officer of FJ Benjamin Ltd, the sole distributor of Girard Perregaux watches in Asia, excluding Japan, Korea and Australia.
He did not attach a dollar figure to the revenue prediction.
FJ Benjamin hopes to boost brand awareness in the local market by pumping NT$30 million (US$903,000) into branding activities this year, which is 30 percent more than the company's branding budget for last year, he said.
The budget could be raised by another 20 percent next year, he added.
Fung said the company has noticed an increase in the spending power of female consumers in Taiwan. Around 400 orders for ladies' watches from its "Cat's Eye" collection, priced at more than NT$500,000 apiece, have been received since the collection was introduced in late January, he said.
According to Fung, with more collections targeted at females being brought into the local market, women now account for some 45 percent of its total clientele, compared with 20 percent just five years ago.
Currently, 30 percent of Girard Perregaux's revenues are generated in Asia, with the remaining 60 percent split equally between Europe and the US.
"The demand from the Asian market is strong. Taiwanese consumers are especially sophisticated and they know upscale watches better than their counterparts in Hong Kong or China," he said.
FJ Benjamin is holding an exhibition of Girard Perregaux watches at the Cathay Financial Center in Taipei's Xinyi District (
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