Maria Bashutkina has spent 15 years inside Swiss watchmaking marketing. She's president of the JIMH, a GPHG Academy member, and she supervised 500 mystery shopping evaluations in luxury boutiques worldwide. Her new book, The Right to Exist, asks why some brands command authority while others with beautiful products and bigger budgets never earn it.

Maria and Alexander get into the answer: legitimacy, and why it beats visibility every time. They cover the 350 watch brands of which maybe ten truly matter, her verdict on the AP x Swatch collab, why 70 percent of luxury boutique visits fall below expectations, the salesperson as experience architect, and how a founder with no heritage can still earn the right to exist.

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