Watches of Switzerland has left the dated head offices it occupied on an edge of town trading estate to one which management say finally fits the image of a £1.5 billion turnover global brand. The group – which takes in Goldsmiths and Mappin and Webb – has moved its 500 head office staff to a smart, three storey office complex with room to grow, just outside Leicester.
Its former offices, a couple of miles down the road, will be kept on and redeveloped as a distribution centre for its stores, and another site called Millfield House, also nearby, will become a Midlands watch service centre, creating 60 new jobs in the coming months.
Group chief executive Brian Duffy said the business had been through huge changes over the decade since he joined – including an IPO, an eightfold growth in online sales, overseas growth and store openings across the UK – and it was time for a new home.
