[Interview] A. Lange & Söhne CEO Wilhelm Schmidt

The popularity of the Odysseus has attracted attention from people outside of traditional watch collectors. However, the company seems to be maintaining a cautious stance, for good reason. CEO Wilhelm Schmidt said:

The discreet evolution of A. Lange & Söhne

Wilhelm Schmidt
CEO of A. Lange & Söhne. Born in Germany in 1963. After studying business administration at Aachen University, he worked for BP Castrol and BMW before assuming his current position in 2011. With an eye on the long-term development of the brand, he has expanded the company's factories and boutiques, and streamlined its core collections. He has stated, "My approach to business is to minimize risk and keep our hands and feet on solid ground." His dedication to maintaining the brand has earned him high praise from those in the watch industry.

"We are very pleased that the Odysseus has been such a great success. However, the popularity of the watch is something that can be said about other models as well. Given that Lange has the highest percentage of handcrafted watches in the watch industry, we must always maintain a balance between demand and production capacity." In other words, even if the Odysseus is popular, the company will not easily increase production. This cautious stance can also be seen in the "colors" that the company is expanding its variations of.

"We've expanded the range of colors we use, but the combinations follow the rules of color harmony. When we developed the white gold version of the Odysseus, we chose a gray dial instead of the blue of the stainless steel model because it looked elegant and matched our color code. However, when you add a seemingly minor variation, such as a different color, the time and consideration that goes into it is often overlooked. With gray, we had to change the pattern applied to the dial surface to achieve a more effective texture. We also need to check all colors and coatings exactly as they will be when the watch is worn, because placing a color underneath the anti-reflective sapphire crystal we use for the watch's windscreen can change the way the light hits the eye."

　The same goes for A. Lange & Söhne's stance on new materials: "The movement must be repairable even after 30 or 50 years, and all components, including the balance spring, must still be able to be produced at that time. That's why we decided to manufacture the balance spring in-house." However, A. Lange & Söhne is also changing, with its efforts towards e-commerce and secondary distribution.

"From a customer point of view, a more structured and transparent secondary market is clearly desirable. That's why the Richemont Group acquired and developed the online shop Watchfinder to become the first point of contact for buying and selling high-quality secondary products made by our group companies. Since last year, we have also been offering the Watchfinder service in our boutique on Bahnhofstrasse in Zurich as a pilot project. We are currently evaluating whether to extend this service to other markets."