Entrepreneurship within Fashion Jewellery

Dänisch-Schweizerische Handelskammer

September 2015

Marnix

•  Dutch - born 1970 •  MSc Mechanical Engineering

•  Accenture, Supply Chain Management Practice •  HILTI Corporation, Liechtenstein

•  Merlone Thermo Sanitari, Wuxi, China

•  Alvarez & Marsal, Shanghai, China •  SENCE Copenhagen, Zürich

Christian T. Priess

•  Danish - born 1970 •  Msc International Economics

•  NKT Cables, Denmark •  HILTI Corporation, Liechtenstein

•  SENCE Copenhagen, Zürich

IMD MBA - Lausanne 2003

•  MBA that focuses on personal and leadership development

•  90 class mates – 43 different nationalities

•  5 – 9 years working experience

•  Between 28 and 35 years old •  Minimum Batchelor´s degree

or equivalent

Why start SENCE Copenhagen?

•  Discussed since 2003 desire to be entrepreneurs and create own company

•  Considered several options and opportunities; as Marnix lived in China, options for China-based manufacturing were explored

•  Learned about fashion jewellery through a market-entry consultancy project for a major Danish Jewellery company

•  Learned that fashion jewellery has interesting aspects:

•  Low barriers to entry

•  Not capital intensive

•  No complicated technical- or warranty-issues

•  Relatively easy to ship

The challenge is to find/create a unique value proposition in a crowded market

Value Proposition

•  What is missing or under-represented in the market?

•  Colour

•  ‘Edel’ product, e.g. with semi-precious stones

•  Something to wear every day, mix&match

Idea to make SENCE Copenhagen

Idea to make SENCE Copenhagen

Idea to make SENCE Copenhagen

Idea to make SENCE Copenhagen

The company today - how do we do it?

Design in Switzerland

Manufacturing in China by Koreans

Warehouse in Switzerland

Selling through agents in all European countries and the USA

To fashion, life style, accessory & Jewellery shops

Guiding principles

•  Quality is piority number 1

•  Customer centric in all aspects, not just product but in every touch-point with the customer

•  Use technology where it brings benefits, not for its own sake

•  Self-financed – spend the time to talk to customers, not to bankers

•  Open culture, limited/no hierarchy à fun place to work

•  Keep it simple! It’s easy to make things complex, but quite difficult to make things simple.

Understanding our customer

Understanding our customer

•  All key employees must visit customers several times per year

•  Participation in selected fashion fairs

1.  The owners stand for Sence; they both love SENCE Copenhagen

2.  They present SENCE as a brand

3.  With the SENCE Display they are very successful and reach a high turnover per square meter

4.  Right location with customers who have a high spending power

Why is Pure Living successful with SENCE jewellery?

Pure Living, Wiesbaden, Germany

Future

•  Walking the path to become an A-brand

•  Rationalisation of Points-of Sale

•  B2C marketing

Standort Switzerland

•  Vorteile:

•  Central location in Europa

•  Skilled and multi-lingual workforce available

•  No / very limited red tape, ‘bureaucracy’ is easy to work with

•  Low corporate income-tax rate

•  Nachteile:

•  High cost, not only of labour, but all additional materials and services, including logistics services

•  Export into EU causes delays and costs

•  Currency uncertainty makes financial planning more complicated

Having your own company – on the balance…

•  Nice to do the things in the way you think they should be – and live with the results

•  Nice to build/create something out of nothing

•  Create your own culture

•  Flexibility in terms of time/location

But…

•  You must be able to live with uncertainty…

•  Business problems are really YOUR problems

•  Work is never finished… until you have reached 100% market-share globally

Thank you