RJ Watches – formerly known as Romain Jérôme – has declared bankruptcy with immediate effect.
Here’s a brief look at the 16-year run of this quirky independent boutique brand, its design-focused existence having formed an interesting tribute to the power (and limits) of marketing.
Romain Jerome Skylab Spider-Man at the 2018 SIHH
Romain Jérôme was founded in 2004 using the first names of founder Alain Bajulaz’s two sons. It was consultant Bajulaz’s love of golf and watches that also gave the brand its first creation: the Golf Master Time, a watch that could count its owner’s strokes on the golf course. At the same time, the brand introduced a tourbillon model in three variations (50 pieces for each variation, too!).
I recall seeing these models in a hotel outside Baselworld, thinking that announcing such complicated models in high numbers – the Golf Master Time was announced in 250 pieces each of three precious metal variations as well – was a seriously bold move, even at a time that the watch industry was experiencing record highs.
A page from Romain Jérôme’s first catalog featuring the Golf Master Time
I didn’t hear much about the brand after that until Yvan Arpa was hired to put Romain Jérôme on track.
There are likely not many aside from me who remember Romain Jérôme before this brand began communicating its Titanic-DNA watches under Arpa. And though the golf-themed timepieces were attractive and seemed well made, they certainly didn’t have the intense attraction of a Hublot Big Bang or Audemars Piguet Royal Oak.
That quickly became clear to the brand’s group of investors, who hired an idea man to breathe real life into it in 2006.
Romain Jérôme under Yvan Arpa: Titanic proportions
The first thing Arpa – a former manager at Hublot – did was scrap the golf watch. If he was going to lead a new brand without a history or a name to success, he was going to do it in a big way.
Arpa came up with the idea of the legend. He knew that without a typical Swiss background, he was going to have to find an idea that made Romain Jérôme’s watches unique. He chose the polarizing route.
Romain Jérôme Titanic-DNA Chrono Tourbillon
In best Jean-Claude Biver tradition, Arpa took the Big Bang concept further at Romain Jérôme, giving a striking timepiece an authentic story just oozing with controversy. Love it or hate it, everyone was talking about it. It was magnetizing and polarizing at the same time.
Arpa also thought up a good story about Romain Jérôme’s reasons for using metal smelted with a genuine piece of the original Titanic on the brand’s watches. The past meets the future: a myth is reborn, just like mechanical watchmaking.
Yvan Arpa at Baselworld 2009 wearing one of his crazy Romain Jérôme creations
But by mid-2009 Arpa and other management and staff were out, with the brand’s owners embarking upon a three-year legal battle with Arpa, which he won in 2012.
To celebrate his victory, Arpa created a unique piece called Rust & Dust whose “bezel rust” came from all the staples removed from the legal papers, while the “dust” on the dial came from the ashes of said papers, which he “ceremoniously burned.” In a press release, Arpa stated it took his team two weeks to remove and process the staples.
As the new CEO, the Saudi-based investor group announced Manuel Emch in December of that year, who had until then been head of Jaquet Droz since 2001. Arpa went on to found his own boutique brand specialized in custom watches of unique design, Artya.
Romain Jérôme CEO Manuel Emch with the Spacecraft (photo courtesy Erik Meza)
At Romain Jérôme, Emch was able to break away from the refined elegance of his creations at the Swatch Group-owned Jaquet Droz, creating timepieces that were modern, colorful, and often controversial: these were timepieces like the Romain Jérôme x Pokémon, Tattoo-DNA by Xoil, Batman-DNA Gotham City, and the unique Spacecraft, which was designed by Alain Silberstein.
Romain Jérôme’s Batman-DNA Gotham City lights up with lume by night
2018: another new era of Romain Jérôme
In January of 2018, Geneva native Marco Tedeschi – another graduate of Hublot’s management team – took over from Emch as CEO of the brand now called RJ Romain Jerome (which did finally officially morph into just “RJ”). Tedeschi was also an engineer.
In this incarnation, RJ continued some of the brand’s mainstay elements like the audacious cartoon-oriented watches, primarily centering on licensed characters like the Joker and Spider-Man, but also added a new line called Arraw.
RJ Arraw Joker from the Villains Edition channeled Batman’s arch-nemesis
These new timepieces were interesting, particularly in their unique designs, but not interesting enough to capture a wider audience in today’s crowded horological landscape, especially at the high asking prices.
February 27, 2020: RJ Watches declares bankruptcy
And just like the Titanic, RJ Watches surprisingly hit an iceberg and has suddenly sunk, taking 33 employees with it.
Announced through a dry, e-mailed press release, RJ has declared bankruptcy thanks to its majority shareholder, Alliance Investment Group SA, having unpredictably stopped the flow of funds.
I am not aware which was RJ’s best market, but if there was any reliance at all on Asia to keep afloat then I would not be surprised in the least if RJ could be termed the first horological victim of the Coronavirus, which has also prompted the cancellation of major watch events like Watches & Wonders and Baselworld. Even larger brands like Hublot have stated a 70-to-80-percent drop in sales in the region since the beginning of the virus spread.
RJ Watches is gone, so if any of these quirky watches ever appealed to you, now is probably the time to hunt one down.
You may also enjoy:
A Brief History Of Transportation Ending With The Romain Jerome Spacecraft
Permanent Art Gets Inside You: Romain Jerome Tattoo-DNA By Xoil
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Sorry to hear of a casualty so soon. Not certain its virus connected. Sounds to me more like they never reached profitability and there was no reason to throw more money down the proverbial rat hole.
Dear Ms Doerr,
I very much enjoy your writing and your views, but I have to say on this occasion that labelling the failure of a brand with a possible link to the coronavirus errs towards the sensationalistic.
I recognise that you put a question mark and also make the point as a hypothetical, but it seems to me the brand was not a healthy one, with years of issues. To contemplate the possibility that two months of the coronavirus is responsible for the end of the brand is, to me, quite a stretch.
I don’t have an issue with posing it as a possibility, but when it is the title of the article, I think it unnecessarily feeds the pessimism and paranoia surrounding covid19, when this article should be about how a brand tried to be deliberately different and how that ultimately did not lead to its longevity.
Thank you for your viewpoints, Brighty, they are much appreciated. I do maintain, however, that it was the fallout of the virus over the last three months that has unfortunately put the nail in RJ’s coffin as sales were considerably down for every brand. I definitely appreciated this brand for its different approach to watchmaking.
Thanks very much for the reply.
I completely agree with Brighty’s statement. While the Coronavirus may have been a component in this companies demise, it can’t possibly be the single point worthy of a headline, unless of course (like most “journalism” these days) its the single component that will guarantee views.
No matter how its defended or justified, the title was designed to grab the attention based on fear, misunderstanding and, as Brighty points out, sensationalism. What makes it even sadder, is that this virus has claimed lives and will continue to do so, to use this as a vehicle to grab views suggests a level of cold calculation and mercenary thinking on the part of those who decided this was a good idea.
Sehr geehrter Herr Shillingford,
ich bin Ihnen dankbar für diese Worte. Ich hätte sie nicht besser schreiben können.
Freundlichst,
Nicole Schwarz
I am grateful for these words. I couldn’t have written them better myself.
Not a brand to which I have I have ever been attracted, but, still, it is a sad sign of difficult times in horology, especially for such small brands. Not too many more, let us hope!
Like an already ailing 97-year old who catches the Coronavirus and then dies, the cause of death is marked as complications from Coronavirus. Sure, that was the proximate cause, but not really the right story. Coronavirus was probably just the straw that broke the camel’s back. And the acute economic effects of the Coronavirus have really only manifested in the last 4-5 weeks. Sounds like RJ was at the precipice already.
The cause of its bankruptcy is the shocking mismanagement and misdirection by Manuel Emch and Marco Tedeschi. They took a brand with a flair of mystery and unusual luxury and turned it into an absolute joke (RJ cartoon, RJ tattoo, RJ spider man, RJ hello kitty). Add to that a team much too large and it was just a matter of time until it sank.
You name it!
Titanic DNA was great and then it turns to a silly brand.
Allan 👆🏾This exactly! A brand that was known for provocative unusual luxury ( titanic) and made great watches such as the spacecraft and moon orbiter tourbillon then suddenly changes direction and becomes a low end brand making joke watches. It had potential in its early years for sure. The last 5 years for RJ led to their demise.
I always thought that the main market for the brand was the Middle East? I haven’t seen any shop carrying the brand in Asia, but I might be wrong. Anyway, they should have kept Yvan Arpa, he was the life and soul of the brand and its greatest asset.
This is sad. I admired RJ for not following the norm. To walk down it’s own path. I almost bought one of their Titanic watches (bought a Bell&Ross instead) when I was in Hong Kong. I thought it was pretty cool to see how they incorporated the Titanic Into it. I think going through so many bosses over the short life span didn’t help. Too many “visions” to keep. I thought it helped to cheapen the watch when they introduced all of these cartoon icons into the watches. Felt not right. ☹️
Definitely sad as I agree with Glenn that it was good this company was out there, challenging watch normalcy. I will have to say that the immediate scuttling of the Gulf Master Time was a mistake. It was a beautiful piece in their earlier catalogue. I do like some of their later creations but I think that mistake by Arpa (and he would probably say now that he shouldn’t have taken the job in the first place) started the brand on it’s long descent toward bankruptcy.
I think if The Virus had any impact at all, it would have been the straw that broke the camel’s back. Ten, twenty years ago money was literally a joke to some Chinese people. They were swimming in it. Deliberate uncouthness was a way of proving oneself beyond petty concerns such as taste. Or the law. Things are VERY different now. The market for thuggish extravagance has dried up. Let’s face it, very VERY few watch enthusiasts will be at all affected by this news. I am far more worried about Tom Hanks.
Interesting how i come back to this article after learning about HYT bankruptcy. One year after RJ. Make me wonder who is next, especially with COVID-19 still ongoing, a year later