The famed watch and jewelry House of Cartier, one of the classiest brands in the industry, can trace its origins back to 1847, when Louis-Francois Cartier opened a small jewelry store in Paris. Over the years, the brand has evolved to become the official jeweler of the Royal courts of England, Spain, Portugal, Russia, Siam, Greece, Serbia, Belgium, Romania, Egypt, Albania, Monaco and France's House of Orleans. Today, it is the preferred brand for royalty, celebrities, and social elite worldwide.
Louis-Francois did not limit himself to the production and sale of traditional jewelry. He expanded his stock to include ivory products, fans, Wedgwood and Sevres porcelain, Christofle silver and watches. Cartier is credited with introducing the first practical wristwatch, the Santos, in 1904. The company was listed as a public company in 1998, when main Vendome shareholder Richemont offered to buy out Vendome's minority shareholder. Cartier is led by Allain Dominique Perrin, chief architect of the company's development for nearly 20 years. Another well known personality in the Cartier establishment is Micheline Kanoui, the company's lead designer and wife to Joseph Kanoui, chairman of the Vendome group.
In the early 1900s, Cartier expanded from its Paris base into London, New York and eventually Russia and the United States. In 1972, a group of investors organized the purchase and eventual reunion of Cartier Paris, New York and London. Today, it is a global powerhouse, operating in more than 200 stores across 125 countries. The company designs, manufactures and sells a wide range of jewelry, timepieces, leather goods and accessories. The team is presently lead by the President and CEO Bernard Fornas.
An undisputable reference in the realm of luxury, Cartier occupies a unique position in the world of jewelry which carries with it a responsibility to act as a role model within the industry. The brand has always shown the greatest resolve to merit trust through responsible purchasing, fabrication and retailing. Now the policy has been formalized as a commitment in the Corporate Responsibility policy. This policy, consistent with the objectives of the RJC (Responsible Jewelry Council),applies to all product lines, activities and supplier practices. Cartier works in close collaboration with its suppliers to encourage their participation and help them comply with its requirements; It continues to invite other industry players to join the movement.
An example of this social responsibility is the company policy since 2009 to not source diamonds from Marange, Zimbabwe in the light of several human rights violations, occurring in these diamond fields. Cartier has also established 'The Fondation de la Haute Horlogerie' to promote and develop the art and expertise of technical and precious fine watch making around the world.
[...] In 2011, Cartier and Richemont had community donations worth €18 million (2009: €20 million). It's flagship society responsibility brand stood as Cartier Fondation pour l'Art Contemporain (Richemont CSR Report, 2011). ➢ Environment: Further, increase in global warming and carbon footprint initiated importance of environment and reduction of energy consumption on corporate level (Votaw, 1972). Reduction of energy and water expenses is the core environment friendly responsibility of Cartier and Richemont (Richemont CSR Report, 2011). Although, the company has negligible reduction and quantitative analysis for the contribution to the larger environment stakeholders. [...]
[...] Cartier has launched three new jewellery and watch collections worldwide (Tank Anglaise, Juste un clou, 'L'Odyssee de Cartier). In past 18-24 months, the company has aggressively focusing on reducing dependency on Chinese luxury marketspace via acquisition of high street retail selling space in France and United States along with new collections of jewellery business activity in Hong Kong. In 2012, the company plans to organically expand in United States and Middle East on long-term basis. Further, it has been horizontally diversifying its watch and jewellery brand portfolio to improve customer segmentation and retention rates. [...]
[...] It is further expected to increase in the next few years. (Datamonitor, 2012). Peer Benchmarking & Future Outlook LVMH, Burberry, Ralph Polo and Gucci Group are the closest publicly listed competitors for Richemont worldwide. Although David Yurman, Roberto Coin etc are the core competitors for Cartier they are neglected due to narrow scope of research (Verdict Research, 2012). The average operating margin across the top 10 luxury players in 2010/11 rose by 3.8 percentage points from the previous year, as all top 10 luxury companies generated stronger operating performance. [...]
[...] Cartier has been aggressively horizontally integrating its core and non core business activities via unique collection launches for past 4-5 years. The traditional and new collections launched in past few years stood as Happy Birthday, Trinity de Cartier, LOVE, Calibre de Cartier, TANK, Pasha de Cartier etc. Further, the company has been primarily focusing on emerging markets with new launches in India and China. ➢ Promotional: Social media and online display advertising are the core promotional platforms for Cartier in United States and other markets worldwide. [...]
[...] This accounted for of total group revenues in 2010-2011. In Middle East, Cartier was the second largest advertising spender after Rolex in the luxury watch marketspace. Further, Cartier was the sixth leading marketer and advertiser in United States with annual spending of US$16 million (2010- 2011). The company has been aggressively focusing on online and social media centric video promotional platforms in United States and other matured luxury marketspaces in past 12 months. The core marketing and promotional strategic initiatives stood as follows: ➢ Product: The Company has niche vertically diversified product portfolio encompassing luxury jewellery and watches (GlobalData, 2012). [...]
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