Author Topic: MWF chats with Mr Carlos A. Rosillo of Bell&Ross  (Read 1940 times)

Offline takashi78

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MWF chats with Mr Carlos A. Rosillo of Bell&Ross
« on: October 15, 2013, 12:52:33 PM »
Recently me and Hobbit had the honor to sit down and have a chat with Mr Carlos A. Rosillo of the Bell&Ross brand with the kind invite from FJ Bejamin.

Just in case you were wondering, yes, Carlos is THE "Ross" from Bell&Ross.
He was in town for the big even which Hobbit also posted about and we had a casual chat with him over some drinks one evening.

Straight Carlos lighted a cigar and we started chatting about Malaysia, he has been here many many times and always likes coming back here, normally he would end his trip to one of the many beautiful beaches of Malaysia but this time round is a bit rush.

Some questions were passed around and below are some recap of what we chatted about.
I have also added some of my own observations to the chat.



2014 B&R will be 20yrs old, Carlos said some would like B&R to develop faster, be more aggressive, but my partners and I believe that we had progressed well in the past 20 years and would not have done anything different. We are proud of what we have achieved.

In the world of watches, progressing very fast does not mean a good thing, it very much depends on the brand and their product line.
I feel B&R has got a very good natural progression and slowly building up the core models of the brand.

Carlos said, not many brands can say that all their core models are categorized in just 5 looks. And various iterations evolved from there.



So what does the next 20yrs hold for B&R?
You can look forward into using more exotic materials, more complications, build finer watches. they are moving from Heritage to Golden Heritage. Their WW1 watches show the brand's capabilities in making fine watches. They have the Vintage collection, but will focus on the BR01 as it is iconic Bell & Ross.

My view on this is that the BR01 series watch is shaping out nice to become the equivalent of Royal Oak, Reverso, Oyster case in terms of being the signature of the brand.
Not many brand can say this about their design in this area. No one will mistake a B&R BR01 as something else  ;D

A question that seems to be the norm this few years, will there be a direction to produce in house movements?
Short answer, no.
Very sensible decision really, why spend so much extra resources to create something when there are movements from trusted and well tested movement suppliers out there?
Why risk lots of problems in terms of time and customer satisfaction when a new movement is introduced.
For B&R at least for the foreseeable future they will continue to put well trusted and proven movements in their watches to ensure great reliability.
Off course the movements supplies is the highest grade for that particular model, and then in house modifications are done for specific models.

As for special limited editions, yes new movements will be created like the one shown below.
WW2 Military Tourbillon
Front side hunter case.
Ti case for lightness.
Love the carbon fiber base plate.












Below are some watches he brought along as well.
The Argentium was what i wore and the other WW1 with tan color strap was on Carlos's wrist.







WW1 Pink Gold Regulateur with automatic movement instead of the manual wind.







Pocket watch that served as inspiration.




We also discussed about different Asian markets and the different behaviors of consumers.
Carlos feels the Malaysian enthusiast are very well informed and knowledgeable and dare i say catching up to the big boys.
Its just the nature of the people here that not many are more openly willingly to share because of various reasons.

One of the main reason for Carlos visit is for the launch of the new B&R Falcon models and a pair of LE with Dassault Falcon planes which are celebrating its 50th anniv.
To be selected as the brand to collaborate with amongst others shows how much mutual respect they have for each other and also the trust put into B&R to create something memorable and also special for this occasion.
Pics of the LE models can be seen in Hobbit's event post.

Some questions were thrown around asking will there be another Airborne model out soon and short answer is not so fast.
Even some of the LE models, no new "reissue" is planned yet and so we will have to wait for BASEL 2014 to see whats next.

We will continue to see more iterations of "flight instruments" from the brand as seen in the very successful models of BASEl 2013 which keeps selling out once it hits the AD and boutique.

We had a really fun time chatting with Carlos who is a very down to earth guy, enjoys life, enjoys what he is doing and i am sure we will continue to see great things coming from the brand in the future.