Gallet – Breitling's latest acquisition

Some time ago it became known that Breitling had bought up the venerable but sleepy Universal Genève in order, to many people's delight, to breathe life into it again. Just recently it was reported that they have now also acquired the departed old brand Gallet – exciting news for those of us who are glad about the renaissance of old watch brands. Eqotime goes through Gallet's long history and speculates about what is to come under Breitling's umbrella. 

Text: Filip Ericsson

Swiss Gallet is not known to that many people today, but the chances are good that collectors of vintage chronographs have a soft spot for the brand, which has a surprisingly rich history of chronographs in particular, often with a spurring wilfulness in form as well as function. 

The remarkable thing about Gallet is that its origin can be traced all the way back to the year 1466 (!) when the watchmaker Humbertus Gallet founded his business in Geneva. It would however take a few hundred years until 1826 before the family name became part of the company name when the descendant Julien Gallet registered Gallet & Cie. At the same time the business moved from Geneva to La Chaux-de-Fonds in the Jura mountains, the classic centre of the Swiss watch industry.  

Gallet was early with wristwatches (pocket watches were after all the standard up until the beginning of the 1900s) and remained a significant supplier of field watches and chronographs to various military powers during the First World War. During the Second World War they supplied wristwatches to the allied forces while Gallet watches were also used during NASA's space missions in the 1960s. 

On Gallet's website you can read that their watches were “designed for professionals on the move”, an apt description of the historical watches and something that bodes well ahead of the re-launch in 2026 (which is confirmed on the website). Below follows a selection of the brand's most important models which we hope will make up inspiration for the new watches! 

Multichron Regulator, 1935 

Multichron was for a long time Gallet's name for their chronographs. The Multichron Regulator came out in 1935 and is one of the more characteristic ones in the brand's long chronograph history. The special thing about the Regulator was that it was in the first place a stopwatch, in that the timing function was given a prominent role on the dial and that the measuring of the time itself remained secondary.  

Inside sat a Venus Caliber 140, a hand-wound movement introduced during the 1920s. The Regulator was, with its prominent, user-friendly chronograph function, ideal for timing during sports events, but also suited orchestra conductors, factory operators, chemists, laboratory technicians and other professions where timing made up an important part of the work.   

Such an odd type would undeniably make the reborn Gallet stand out on the vast watch market and at the same time offer a still very useful function.  

Flying Officer, 1939 

According to connoisseurs the very most legendary and sought-after Gallet watch that has been made. The Flying Officer came out in 1939, though at first under the name Flight Officer, and was ahead of its time with its rotating twelve-hour bezel with 23 cities inscribed along the outer edge of the dial. This allowed the pilots to work out the local time directly during the flight as the time zones were passed. 

The Flying Officer was not only a pioneer when it comes to world time indication in a chronograph but also one of the first water resistant ones. Only one other Gallet – the Clamshell – was earlier.  

Gallet's forward-looking pilot's watch was to begin with exclusively available to the allied forces' flight officers during the Second World War. After the war it became available to the general public as well. 

The Flying Officer is also famous for having been worn by Harry Truman, the 33rd president of the USA. He was given it as a present in 1939 during the time he was a senator. The watch can today be viewed by the public at the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library & Museum in his home town of Independence, Missouri.  

A follow-up to this beautiful world time watch ought to have a given place in Gallet's coming palette. 

Multichron Officer, 1939 

With its square 26x26mm case the Multichron Officer is an odd figure in the historical Gallet palette. But what a figure! It is said to have come out during 1939 and was, as the name suggests, a dress watch for officers. It is said that barely fewer than 100 examples were made, which makes it extremely rare. Not many can still be left today after 86 years.  

Despite the professional aura of the Gallet chronographs, the Officer's dial is close to art deco in its expression. Beautiful and professional at one and the same time, like a work of industrial art. Technically it impresses too, above all by managing to fit a complicated chronograph movement inside the minimal case. It is incidentally the Caliber 69 from Valjoux, a relatively unusual movment as no more than 3964 examples are said to have been made. 

A spiritual successor to this one is what we want to see, Breitling! 

Multichron 12, late 40s 

The 1960s Multichron 12 was for a long time a main track in Gallet's palette and was sold from the late 40s up until the beginning of the 80s. It came in several executions; as a clean chronograph with three timing registers in the dial, a variant with tachymeter and telemeter and a version with a rotating 12-hour bezel, the latter called “Pilot”.  

The Multichron 12 thereby worked both as a racing and pilot's chronograph as well as for urban gentlemen who appreciated its classic, elegant lines.  

The watch measured 37mm in diameter and was water resistant to 100 metres, a Gallet-typical peculiarity not at all common for chronographs in the 1960s.  

Inside the Multichron 12 ticked either a hand-wound Caliber 72 from Valjoux, a reliable choice for a number of high-standing manufacturers at the time, such as Rolex and Heuer – or the Caliber EP40 from Excelsior Park, also an extremely high-quality movement that offered modernities such as so-called column wheel construction.  

The Multichron 12 and its pilot sibling with a rotating bezel made up the backbone of the Gallet range and ought, given its obvious elegance, to do so again. 

Multichron Yachting, 1945 

Of all the Multichron variants that were spat out from the Gallet factory, the Multichron Yachting is one of the more distinctive ones, even if the form in itself was conventional. It came out in 1945 and was, as the name suggests, intended for sailing boat racing.  

The right-hand chronograph register in the dial contained a 15-minute countdown scale to use for a flying start where the boats needed to be navigated to the starting point 15 minutes before the starting shot. Otherwise it worked as an ordinary chronograph, just as obviously elegant as other Gallet watches. 

Under the shell there ticked during the first decades a hand-wound movement from Excelsior Park while later watches from the 70s and 80s contained Valjoux movements.  

The Multichron Yachting is of course a good-looking and cool chronograph, cherished by the enthusiasts. Whether anyone has a need to time a flying start at sea today is rather more doubtful, but it would still make up a fun variant in a new chronograph range from the brand.  

Gallet under Breitling 

Breitling's buying up of departed old brands should be seen in the light of a wish to broaden the range and cover more price levels within the luxury segment. This is also confirmed when you scrutinise the price classes where the newly acquired brands are expected to land. 

Breitling will remain in the mid-price segment together with brands such as Omega and IWC, while Universal Genève will be placed higher up, with a model palette that starts around 150 000 kronor. 

Gallet for its part will be placed below Breitling, and work as an entry gate to the luxury segment with prices that start around perhaps 30 000 kronor. Through the three brands a very broad price span is thereby captured, all within the group. 

This means that the new Gallet watches will in all likelihood be fitted with movements from outside manufacturers, and thus not be gifted with so-called inhousemovements. That should however reasonably not mean any stumbling block since the brand has by tradition always bought its movements from outside, such as from Valjoux and Excelsior Park. 

According to interviews with Breitling bosses it is suggested that Gallet will remain a “real” brand, that is get its own head office and its own manufacturing facility, but will probably be sold in selected Breitling boutiques.  

With movements from an outside party, quality watches for reasonable sums in Gallet's traditional spirit are made possible, easily available through Breitling's sales organisation. If it is done right, and they manage to blast in the elegance of the Gallet watches of former times, it could turn out really good.