STATE OF THE NATION: The financial breakdown of the UK’s top watch retailers
Who are the biggest movers and shakers operating in the UK watch industry at retail level? Watch Insider has been crunching a decade’s worth of data from the biggest jewellers across the UK to find out exactly how the landscape of the UK watch market looks. We’ve looked at turnover and operating profit as the key metrics, and drawn comparisons over time, as well as between competing retailers. In a first ever report of such depth and detail, we’ve compiled the results, which make for fascinating reading.
Unsurprisingly, Watches of Switzerland Group — which includes Watches of Switzerland, Goldsmiths, and Mappin & Webb — is, far and away, the biggest player in the market. As a group it’s slowly nudging towards £1 billion in turnover annually, with the next highest sales being that of Signet Jewelers — Ernest Jones and H. Samuel — being just over £250 million.
Out of the independents in the list, Beaverbrooks — which still operates as an independent, family-owned business despite having dozens of stores across the country — has the largest market share, with turnover of £217 million in 2025. Other honourable mentions go to Pragnell at £100 million and Berry’s at £83 million.
It’s also fascinating to track the growth of these turnover figures over a sustained period of time. For instance, while the likes of Prestons and Laings have grown turnover by about 500% in a decade, Signet Jewelers has seen turnover decline by 40% over the same period. And it’s also incredible to observe that Signet Jewelers was comfortably ahead of Watches of Switzerland Group back in 2016, over £80 million higher in sales. Fast forward to today, and WoS is now over three times larger from a revenue perspective.
As in all industries, turnover is only half the story. Some of the most profitable jewellers aren’t even in the top 10 for sales, including David M. Robinson, Chisholm Hunter, and Mallory. Pre-owned platform Watchfinder stands out for having such significant revenue (over £100 million) but lost £12 million in 2025. Signet Jewelers has done well to reverse its losses and record an operating profit of £2.5 million last year, but it still represents less than 1% of its turnover. In contrast, the likes of Berry’s and Prestons recorded operating profit that’s about 13%–15% of their revenue.
More generally, operating profit seems to have become increasingly squeezed in the past decade, albeit with some significant exceptions. For example, in 2017 not a single jeweller in the UK’s top 23 recorded an operating loss, but by 2024 almost 20% of them had. This can be put down to myriad factors, including: the cost of reinvestment in stores, Covid lockdowns, the ending of the VAT Retail Export Scheme, and general economic headwinds against the backdrop of increasing taxes and regulation.
Skip to these sections to see data on individual companies:
- Watches of Switzerland Group
- Signet Jewelers
- Beaverbrooks
- Boodles
- Watchfinder
- Pragnell
- F.Hinds
- Berry’s Jewellers
- Prestons
- Laings
- Chisholm Hunter
- David M Robinson
- Lunn’s
- Fraser Hart
- Michael Spiers
- Mallory of Bath
- Hamilton & Inches
- Rox
- Bucherer
- Hugh Rice
- Robert Gatward Jewellers
WATCHES OF SWITZERLAND GROUP
SIGNET JEWELERS
BEAVERBROOKS
BOODLES
WATCHFINDER
PRAGNELL
F.HINDS
BERRY’S JEWELLERS
PRESTONS
LAINGS
CHISHOLM HUNTER
DAVID M ROBINSON
LUNN’S
FRASER HART
MICHAEL SPIERS
MALLORY OF BATH
HAMILTON & INCHES
ROX
BUCHERER
HUGH RICE
ROBERT GATWARD JEWELLERS
NOTE: Accounts published at Companies House do not always paint a fully accurate picture of a company’s performance. Businesses can legally organise their accounts in a way that makes them more tax efficient, for instance, especially for global businesses that have UK subsidiaries. This is why we’ve focused on annual turnover and annual operating profit in this report. These are the two most reliable indicators because there is very little book cooking that can affect these figures. Plus showing data over a full decade also helps to weed out statistical anomalies.
