You are currently viewing Entrepreneur Plans to Revive a French Family Watch Brand

Eberjax, which made chronographs, stopped production in 1983. But Christophe Hoppé intends to start it again.

In May, Brigitte Courtet said, she was shocked to receive an email about reviving Eberjax, her family’s defunct watch business.

It had made chronographs, or stopwatches, from 1947 to 1983 in a large factory in Charquemont, a French region near the Swiss border. And while Ms. Courtet, 66, said she had not done anything with the brand since buying it from her father and uncle in 1983 as production ended, she now was eager to return to the watch world.

The email had come from Christophe Hoppé, 50, the French-born founder of Bausele watches in Sydney, Australia. (He translated for Ms. Courtet during a recent video interview.)

About 20 years ago he inherited a 38-millimeter gold-plated stainless steel Eberjax chronograph from his paternal grandfather and, through online searches, found out the name Eberjax was in the public domain.

Keep reading this article on The New York Times Small Business.

Leave a Reply