Who Owns Baume and Mercier?

Louis-Victor and Celestin Baume, two brothers, founded a watch trading business in the Jura village of Les Bois, Switzerland, in 1830, later moving operations to Geneva. The firm built its early reputation supplying Swiss-made movements and finished watches to retailers across Europe rather than selling under a single consumer-facing name.

In 1918, William Baume, a descendant of the founding family, partnered with Paul Mercier, a Geneva watch dealer, to form Baume et Mercier. The new firm registered its motto, "accept only perfection," and began producing watches under its own name rather than solely as a supplier to other retailers. The company earned Poincon de Geneve certification for several early movements, a quality hallmark still recognized in Swiss watchmaking.

Baume et Mercier expanded through the mid-20th century with classically styled dress watches. The Riviera line launched in 1973, introducing an unusual twelve-sided steel case at a time when the Swiss watch industry was reeling from the quartz crisis. The Riviera became the brand's signature sports-luxury model and remains in production today. The Classima line followed in the 1990s as the brand's core dress watch collection, and Clifton launched in 2013 as a heritage-inspired line referencing the brand's early 20th century case designs.

Baume et Mercier joined the Vendome Luxury Group in the 1980s, the entity that Johann Rupert restructured into Richemont in 1988. Unlike many Richemont maisons that were acquired individually and publicly (such as Vacheron Constantin in 1996 or Panerai in 1997), Baume et Mercier's entry into the group predates Richemont's formal incorporation, and the exact transaction terms from that period are not publicly disclosed.

Under Richemont, the brand has been positioned deliberately below its sibling maisons IWC, Jaeger-LeCoultre, and Vacheron Constantin on price, serving as an entry point into Swiss haute horlogerie. Michael Guenoun took over as chief executive in 2024, succeeding a series of prior leaders, and used the 2025 Watches and Wonders show to refresh the Riviera chronograph line and introduce updated Clifton and Hampton models aimed at reasserting the brand's design identity.