At the recent SIHH I witnessed in the best sense the new IWC’s focus on the customer. It’s not that they were not very good in the past, but in this instance the company and particularly the new CEO, Chris Grainger, went beyond all expectations.
Let’s start this story at the beginning. Several weeks ago on Instagram Chris posted a picture of his newly acquired 5002 Big Pilot. He noted in his comments that it had a fish crown. I replied to his post, not in a complaining way, that I too had a 5002 that was one of the first sold, but that mine, unfortunately no longer had its fish crown…it was replaced by a Probus crown on service call some years ago. My BP is indeed one of the first to be delivered in August 2002 at Wempe in London. This is very close to the first shipments of this iconic BP. After this exchange, I didn’t think anything further about this issue.
But a couple of days later on IG, Chris replied to my comment asking if I wanted a fish crown. He indicated they could do the switcheroo. I was doubtful knowing the history of the reason the fish crown was replaced. It had issues with water resistance and the replacement crowns were Probus BP crowns. Simply put, over the past few years no one was able to get the crown back to its original state. I assumed it would still be impossible. So I wrote an email to Chris thanking him for his offer, but I had to assume it would be impossible to do.
Well, I was wrong. At SIHH completely out of the blue Chris grabbed me out of the Collector Meeting crowd, where he had just given a brief talk, and asked me if I was wearing by BP. I was very surprised he even knew who I was; we had never met. I responded that yes I was wearing it that day. He asked me to give it to him. I was a bit bewildered as to why. He told me that he would have my crown exchanged for a newly designed and perfect BP fish crown and that I would have the watch back on my wrist the next day. Needless to say I was stunned.
This is a case of real attention to a customer. His team apparently was in on the process as all was arranged to have a watchmaker in Geneva replace the crown and to the requisite water resistance testing. I still can’t believe my good fortune.
But, this is not the end. The next day, I was contacted by text while at the show asking me to return to the IWC booth right away. I, of course, ran right over. To my amazement, Chris took me into the private meeting room and presented me with the newly installed and updated 5002.
Here is the exchange recorded for me.
The handoff:
I am till stunned and showing off my retuned to original form BP 5002.
I then asked Chris for his autograph in the new IWC 2018/2019 catalog. He was most obliging to a mere collector when he has so much more to be doing at the show.
I wrote an email to him afterwards expressing my gratitude and complimenting him on his customer focused strategy and effort. I think his response says it all:
“My mission here is to look after a great brand and make our clients happy; this is what I am here for.”
I believe everyone can sense the change in attitude and focus. Chris is leading by example. We have a lot to look forward too in the future as his thumbprint will be all over the organization. His staff is thrilled to be part of this too.
In closing, thanks Chris. I will be eternally grateful for your attention to someone you did not know.
Lastly, let me share a quick and dirty picture of my restored 5002 along with the original crown that was replaced and the interim Probus Crown.
