Vaucher Manufacture Fleurier: operational excellence as a culture

In 2020, Vaucher Manufacture Fleurier asked itself a simple but demanding question: how can we lastingly transform the way we produce in order to serve our clients better?

The answer would not come from a grand theoretical plan. It would come from the shop floor and, above all, from the women and men who bring it to life every day.

It all began with the CLEAR programme (Client, Lean, Efficiency, Agility, Resources), a framework that sets the course without locking anyone into rigidity. The first actions were deliberately basic, in the best sense of the word: daily Management Meetings were introduced in the workshops. Every morning, teams gather in front of their performance board to identify deviations, share problems and decide on actions. No PowerPoint, no remote committee: decisions are made where value is created.

These daily rituals change something more subtle than the indicators: they change the way people work together. Problems are no longer the concern of one isolated manager; they become a collective matter, dealt with openly, in a spirit of transparency and shared progress.

Shortly afterwards, VMF rolled out QRQC (Quick Response Quality Control), a structured problem-solving method that leaves no room for quick fixes. Every problem is tackled at its root, with rigour and traceability. It is less spectacular than a technological revolution, but it is what makes it possible to build on solid ground.

2021: making planning and the service level reliable

In 2021, attention turned to a critical point in any manufacture: planning.

The finding was clear: the service level was not meeting our clients’ expectations. VMF launched a dedicated project to regain control of its flows, synchronise the stages of production and turn the delivery promise into a reliable commitment.

The results would speak for themselves in the months that followed.

2022 marked a turning point. VMF created its first Autonomous Production Unit (APU), dedicated to two specific clients. The change ran deep: moving away from an organisation by trade, where each workshop works in a silo according to its speciality, towards an organisation built around the client and the product.

This was not a mere redrawing of the organisation chart. It was a change of logic. Watchmakers, mechanics and operators from different trades learned to work together within a single unit, with a shared goal: the product flow, from end to end. This required training, the development of multi-skilling and a real investment in the teams’ skills. Employees who had mastered one trade discovered the constraints and know-how of their neighbours in the workshop. This cross-fertilisation of knowledge does more than serve the flow: it enriches the people themselves and, with them, the quality of the work produced.

The gamble paid off. The indicators moved significantly: lead time was cut by a factor of 2.5, work in progress was halved, and the service level settled lastingly above 95%, with deliveries smoothed on a weekly basis. For our clients, this means predictability, a rare commodity in high-end watchmaking.

Building on these results, VMF decided in 2024 to roll out two new APUs. The project was ambitious: it required a full year of building work to reconfigure the production areas. You do not simply overlay a concept onto an existing floor plan; you physically restructure the working environment so that it serves the logic of flow.

At the end of 2025, a further milestone was reached: movement assembly and regulation were integrated directly into the first APU. The production flow is now complete within the unit, from machining to final assembly. Fewer transfers, less waiting, more control.

Today, VMF is opening a new chapter. Lean principles, proven in the workshops, are being extended to administrative functions and to new product development. The aim: to apply the same rigour of flow and continuous improvement to the creation process, so that operational agility does not stop at the doors of production.

Six years after the launch of CLEAR, the programme is no longer a project. It is a culture carried by teams who have learned to see change not as a constraint but as a skill in its own right. Each improvement calls for another; each result raises a new question. VMF is not looking for a finish line, because there isn’t one. The ambition is to stay one step ahead, not through a single breakthrough, but through a continuous capacity to question itself and evolve.