Baselworld is the world's largest and oldest watch and jewelry trade fair, which was to be held from April 30th to May 5th, 2020. Will it be held in Basel or not, with what number of exhibitors? Market participants have been asking all these questions for a long time. MCH Group gave them an answer: the exhibition will be held in April next year (in 2021).
The show will be held in Basel, but now it will be called differently - Houruniverse. Details will follow in August. The fever in the specialized exhibitions for the watchmakers' segment did not start this year, but it seems that 2020 may lay new foundations for watch presentations. The year began with an event with a different format: the LVMH group presented premieres from its brands Bvlgari, TAG Heuer, Hublot, and Zenith in January at its exhibition in Dubai. This way, LVMH managed to establish interaction with both partners and journalists before the global quarantine faced by the organizers of the spring events in Switzerland. In February, the cancellation of the Geneva exhibition Watches & Wonders (SIHH heiress) was announced, which was to be held at the end of April. The upcoming Watches & Wonders trade show was rescheduled for the beginning of April 2021.
In early March, Rolex, Patek Philippe, Chanel, Tudor, and Chopard refused to participate in Baselworld, while Jean-Christophe Babin, CEO of Bvlgari, told about the idea of a new show Geneve Watch Days, which can be held in parallel with the April Watches & Wonders in Geneva. It seemed that Geneva was finally becoming a new exhibition center.
However, the coronavirus forced us to look for other options in 2020. In April, Watches&Wonders was held in a virtual format. Presentations of 30 brands appeared on the exhibition's website on April 25th, and the Geneve Watch Days event was moved to the end of August. As a result, Breitling, Bvlgari, De Bethune, Gerald Genta, Girard-Perregaux, H. Moser & Cie, MB&F, Ulysse Nardin, and Urwerk will be waiting for its customers at scattered events in Geneva hotels from August 26th to 29.
Watches & Wonders also decided not to give up offline positions this year. Organizers of the event announced the holding of the exhibition in Shanghai. Invitation holders (as the number of visitors is now limited) will be able to evaluate new products by A. Lange & Söhne, Baume & Mercier, Cartier, IWC Schaffhausen, Jaeger-LeCoultre, Panerai, Parmigiani Fleurier, Piaget, Purnell, Roger Dubuis, and Vacheron Constantin from 9 to September 13th.