Geneva — Richemont’s plan to slash 210 watchmaking jobs in Switzerland is sending shockwaves from Geneva to some of the country’s remote mountain villages, the cradle of high-end watch manufacturing. In Le Sentier, a town perched in the middle of the Jura mountain range, straddling the border between France and Switzerland, about 400 people protested on Thursday against plans to cut the workforce of Vacheron Constantin and Piaget. Forty of the positions destined to go are in the Joux Valley, a rural area about 60km from Geneva that is home to luxury timepiece makers including Audemars Piguet, Blancpain, Jaeger-LeCoultre and Breguet. "We live in anxiety now," said Alemao Ricardo, a 48 year-old Portuguese worker in the nearby town of Le Brassus who decorates Vacheron Constantin watches that sell for up to $150,000. "It could be me going, it could be my colleague." Swiss watch exports were hit by the biggest monthly drop in seven years in October as demand fell in almost every major ma...
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