Rolex Acquires 100-Year-Old Partner, Retailer Bucherer – Kommersant

The most famous and successful watch manufacturer Rolex has announced the purchase of the equally famous Swiss jewelry and watch retailer Bucherer. The deal, for an undisclosed amount, must be approved by the Swiss antimonopoly authorities.

Cooperation between Rolex and Bucherer began almost a century ago, in 1924, when the Bucherer family shop, opened in Lucerne in 1888, began selling watches from the brand created by Hans Wilsdorf. Over time, Bucherer became the largest Rolex dealer and in recent decades has bought up its competitors in Paris, London and New York, bringing the number of stores to a hundred, with 53 of them selling Rolex, 48 – the second Rolex brand Tudor.

Now the representative of the third generation of the family, Jorg Bucherer, due to the lack of direct heirs ready to take over the business, decided to part with him. The buyer, or as stated in the press release, the successor, was the Rolex group. Jörg Bucherer, who has worked with Mr. Wilsdorf, will remain honorary chairman of the company.

With this acquisition, Rolex adds to the most powerful (about 1 million watches a year) and the most profitable watchmaker in the world (the company’s turnover in 2022 was estimated at almost 10 billion Swiss francs) a powerful retail network. It is not entirely clear whether the production of Carl F. Bucherer watches, which were produced in a relatively small (about 20 thousand copies per year) quantity, will continue. Rolex assures that the retail chain will retain the name and continue to sell watches of other brands (there are more than 40 in the retailer’s portfolio), but changes are inevitable, although they will not follow immediately.

Alexey Tarkhanov, Paris