World-famous Austrian jewelry brand Frey Wille celebrates its 10th year in the Ukrainian market in 2017.
Since the company opened its first Kyiv shop in 2007, Frey Wille has built up a loyal clientele of Ukrainian customers who appreciate the elegance and interesting designs of its products.
“The company’s owner was sure that his brand would find connoisseurs in Ukraine, and he was right,” says Oksana Fandul, the general manager of Frey Wille Ukraine, the company’s Ukrainian subsidiary.
Frey Wille Ukraine was founded in the summer 2005 as an enterprise with 100 percent Austrian capital. Today, it has 16 employees working in three Frey Wille shops in Ukraine — two in Kyiv and one in Odesa.
Internationally, Frey Wille has 86 boutiques spread across more than 30 countries on four continents. The company’s largest markets are Russia, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and China. Ukraine is among the company’s top 10 markets according to sales volumes.
“Ukrainians are frequent visitors to Frey Wille’s stores, and have always been interested in fashion, jewelry and artistry,” Fandul says.
Frey Wille was started in Vienna in 1951 by artist Michaela Frey. By the 1970s, when Frey’s business has grown significantly, she decided to focus on creativity and brought in partner Dr. Friedrich Wille to take care of the company’s legal and financial matters. The combination of Frey’s remarkable creativity and Wille’s entrepreneurship brought the company even more commercial success.
After Frey’s death in 1980, Wille took over the company and started working with artist Simone Grunberger-Wille as creative director.
The firm has made enamel jewelry its signature product — combining metals with opaque enameling that resembles glossy paint. Each design can employ up to 20 colors.
The brand also celebrates Europe’s most famous artists, with collections inspired by Claude Monet, Gustav Klimt, Alphonse Mucha and Friedensreich Hundertwasser.
Recently the company added watches to its product line, specifically a gold watch line. Beside jewelry and watches, the company has now also expanded into accessories such as scarfs, handbags, belts, ties, cuff links and fine pens.
Frey Wille is a luxury brand, and prices for its necklaces, bangles and rings vary between $125 and $1,150. Its jewelry is also popular among celebrities — U.S. actor Danny Burstein, actress and singer Rebecca Luker and reality star Kris Jenner are among the brand’s admirers.
“Our customers prefer timeless and individual elegance to pretentious jewelry and fast-moving fashion trends,” says Ruth Albrecht, Frey Wille’s marketing and communications director. “For us it is most important to express with the jewelry the personality of the wearer and to highlight their individuality.”
Frey Wille is still a family business, with a small factory. Every piece is produced in Vienna. Output is limited, and cannot be compared to that of companies like Tiffany or Cartier, which have completely different structures, Albrecht says.
While the company is doing well in Ukraine, the country’s recent economic and political turmoil has affected sales.
“(People’s) expenses have become more thought out, more planned. But in hard times people (also) need positive emotions,” says Fandul, adding that the company still has a lot of regular customers in Ukraine.
“In the nearest future we don’t plan to expand, but taking into account that we have regular customers in Kharkiv, Dnipro, Lviv, maybe one of those Ukrainian cities will become the next place on Frey Wille’s map,” Fandul said.
Frey Wille’s shops in Ukraine:
46 Velyka Vasylkivska St., Kyiv,
tel. 044–223–3944
176 Antonovycha St., Ocean Plaza shopping mall, Kyiv,
tel. 044–228–8765
29 Yekaterynynska St., Odesa,
tel. 048–714–4878
