For the watch industry, the clock is counting down on a fresh challenge. In 2025, the first filings are due in the European Union’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (C.S.R.D.), which obliges some companies to disclose their environmental and social impacts as well as their financial details.

Some experts say the pending demand has led much of the watch industry to “greenhushing” — downplaying its communications on what is called E.S.G., the environment, social and governance framework that companies use to monitor sustainability and ethics.

But why?

“There’s fatigue in the marketplace about sustainability,” said Diana Verde Nieto, the author of “Reimagining Luxury: Building a Sustainable Future For Your Brand” and the co-founder of the corporate education platform Edify Collective. “It has moved from a passion for doing the right thing to the technicalities of how the right thing should be done.”

“Companies are greenhushing,” she continued. “They have to be more conscious, but also the backdrop is volatility in the market, uncertainty around the U.S. election and consumers moving from stuff to experiences. E.S.G. is out of fashion, but the reality is this will all change next year.”

The deadline varies, but companies in the European Union that have more than 250 employees and annual net sales of more than 50 million euros ($54.3 million) must file during 2025 or face fines or administrative sanctions. Those also vary, depending on the country where the company is headquartered. (To strengthen the effort, the directive was supposed to be added to the national laws of all E.U. member states by July, but only a handful, including France, Italy and Sweden, have yet done so.)

By 2029, companies that are not based in the European Union, but which generate more than €150 million a year there, also will have to report.