The Business of Watches [45] Fears Watches Founder And Chief Executive Officer Nicholas Bowman-Scargill

This week on The Business of Watches, an in-depth discussion with Nicholas Bowman-Scargill, the founder and Chief Executive Officer of Fears Watches. Nicholas has packed a lot into his 39 years. For the last decade he's been helming the brand originally founded by his great-great-great grandfather, Edwin Fears, in Bristol, England way back in 1846.

Incredibly, Bowman-Scargill wasn't even aware of the Fears brand and family connection when he decided to train as a watchmaker at Rolex in the U.K. That move into watches followed an ill-timed foray into investment banking on the eve of the Global Financial Crisis, in 2008.

By the time Bowman-Scargill restarted the brand in 2016, it had been dormant for nearly four decades. Its revival has been an exercise in business challenges that have often been met by practicing the art of project management, a skill set that he and his fellow Brits are uniquely adept at, he says. Fears has now grown to about 15 people and returned to its roots in Bristol. From flirting with bankruptcy to implementing a dress code for employees and overseeing the design and production of a perpetual calendar model, Bowman-Scargill relays the dramatic tale of how the company has survived and thrived in the crowded and competitive arena of mid-tier priced timepieces.

It's a heck of a story that offers heaps of insight for any watch enthusiast, collector or small business owner. From what he learned and has applied at Fears from his time at Rolex, to what's in the envelope that's only to be opened should he meet an unexpected demise, what kind of investors he's accepted to the family business, and how to bring that non-watch enthusiast customer to the brand, Bowman-Scargill serves up plenty of candor, wisdom and experience in this wide-ranging discussion.

Show Notes:

0:48 New York Watch Week (Hodinkee)

1:19 Bristol England (VisitBristol.co.uk)

1:35 Edwin Fear (BBC News)

3:48 List of Fears managing directors (Fears website)

5:08 The Succession Planning Gap: Real Stats on Why Family Businesses Struggle to Prepare (Kreischer Miller)

7:32 Corporate Governance (OECD)

9:36 Carp Fisher magazines (The Carp Society)

10:03 Master of the Universe - Investment Bankers (Prime Video)

10:19 The Men Who Destroyed Deutsche Bank (Der Spiegel)

10:47 The watches that bankers blow their first bonuses on (efinancialcareers.com)

12:45 Francis Bourgeois (YouTube)

14:02 Rolex Service Centres in London

17:11 Moritz Grossmann history and founding of the German School of Watchmaking (company website)

18:35 Fears Watch Company Limited (Companies House)

20:07 The First Fears Watch - The Redcliff Date from 2016

23:26 Fears Brunswick White 38

27:30 Établissage (FHH)

30:15 Mighty Mercedes Benz Models of the 1980s (Hagerty UK)

31:36 Inside Swiss Watch Manufacturing At the EPHJ (Swiss 101 Hodinkee)

35:25 The Power of Dress (Psychology Today)

42:35 Becoming a Civilian (Jason Heaton SWIMPRUF)

42:53 Meet the Fears Garrick (Worn & Wound)

48:02 British Watch & Clock Makers Alliance

48:25 What Really Happened to the Costa Cruises' Costa Concordia (Cruise Critic)

49:50 What is a Project Manager? (Project Manager YouTube)

55:20 What is cash flow and how do you manage it? (British Business Bank)

58:20 Chargeback Fraud: How It Works, Common Types & How To Prevent It (Unit21.ai)

58:46 Being Fearless: The First Ten Years of Rebuilding a Watch Company by Chris Hall with Foreward by Mike France (Waterstones)