Swatch has been forced to apologise and take down an advert featuring an Asian model pulling up the corners of his eyes following accusations of racism.
The luxury brand has received widespread backlash on Chinese social media as users said the advert mimicked the “slanted eye” pose, a racist taunt about Asian people.
The Swiss watch company shared an apology on social media, in both English and Chinese, which read: “We have taken note of the recent concerns regarding the portrayal of a model in images for the Swatch ESSENTIALS Collection.
“We treat this matter with the utmost importance and have immediately removed all related materials worldwide”, the statement continued. “We sincerely apologise for any distress or misunderstanding this may have caused.”
The advert has prompted calls for a boycott of the company on social media. Swatch also owns other luxury brands such as Harry Winston, Longines, Omega, Tissot and Breguet.
One user of Weibo, a Chinese social media website similar to X, wrote: “You can apologise, but I will not forgive."
Shares in the Swatch Group stalled by two per cent to 135.70 Swiss francs (SFr) following the controversy.
The luxury brand is also struggling after US president Donald Trump imposed a 39 per cent tariff on Swiss exports.
Peter Xu, a fashion influencer in China with over seven million Weibo followers, said he believed the controversy would impact Swatch's business in China, but given the speed of the apology, the fallout was likely to be relatively short-term.
"It was pretty stupid to release images like those ones," he said.
Revenue for the watchmaker slumped 14.6 per cent to 6.74 billion Swiss francs (£6.1 billion) in 2024, hit by a downturn in demand in China, where Swatch said it was seeing "persistently difficult market conditions and weak demand for consumer goods overall".
