Rolex shortage, ways to possibly alleviate it?

[SkyDwelling]

I began attempting to get a blue dial Sky Dweller in 2017 when the watch was announced and it has been nothing but unpleasantness. At different times I could have easily bought it gray market and I've always had the money for that but I chose not to on principle. Also because I want the experience I always had whenever I bought a Rolex. I used to be able to walk into an AD, find everything in stock (except the SS Daytona), buy a spanking new watch with my own name on the warranty then go home and enjoy removing the stickers and sizing it to my wrist. That's a part of the fun of buying a Rolex and I will not replace it with a gray market watch purchase.

For 4 years I contacted almost a hundred AD's. No one has my watch, no one would even put my name on a waiting list for one, and on occasion it would be implied that if I buy available watches it might be a good start for a "relationship" that might get me on a list. I do want the watch but nowhere am I desperate enough to spend tens of thousands on watches that I do not want in order to get it. This means that 4 years on I'm still unable to get the watch nor even have my name on a list. No problem, my life will not come to a halt because of a watch or any other piece of goods.

Still I don't understand why they haven't thought of certain measures to end this problem, and wanted to discuss it with you in case I was missing something. I don't believe the suggestion that Rolex wants this or loves it. If it did it wouldn't have instructed AD's to take extreme action to disrupt gray market such as cutting the tags, removing the stickers at the store, and keeping the warranty card for a year. Also if you look at Rolex social media you will see chaos. Every time Rolex makes a post it gets hundreds of negative replies from people complaining they can't get watches and telling stories of blackmail by AD's and such. No one wants that and Rolex can't be happy about this ongoing negativity on its social media.

I looked at secondary market sites and saw a great abundance of watches with extremely high mark ups. My desired Sky Dweller goes for 25 to 30 thousand that's more than double the price. It is the same on the bay. Hundreds of watches for double the price most brand new with stickers and warranties with recent dates. Thousands of people therefore get those watches without any intent to keep them and instead unload them for double the money immediately. Two ideas I think might fix this.

1st, why don't Rolex increase the prices of the watches to what ever people are paying for them gray market? If every watch made is happily bought by some one at a high mark up or double the price then why don't Rolex sell them for these exact prices? The speculators would then still buy the watches and sell them at triple the price? No problem Rolex raises the price again as long as people are willing to buy every last watch for that money from gray market. This should continue until the watches reach a price that no one wants to pay a dollar over and that would kill the grey market and Rolex would still sell every last watch made.

That sounds unfair to normal collectors who then have to pay three times the original price, but they could never have got the watches at the original price any way. If in order to get a desired watch at the original price one first must buy other undesirable watches that they can't sell for what they paid for, are they really getting the desired watches at that original price when they have lost a lot of money on other watches first?

2nd solution I was thinking about, is some thing like what car companies do. If you want to buy one of the limited hyper cars you can't sell it for a certain number of years or else you will be black listed and would never get another car from them. Why won't Rolex decide that only the person who's name is on the warranty can have any sort of service for a number of years after purchase? If some one else takes the watch to any AD for repair in that period the watch is rejected and it's serial gets black listed and the buyer would have to find another way to service it or get original parts for it. It might not end it completely but sure a person would hesitate to buy a gray market watch if he knows that for 7 years if the watch has a problem or gets damaged it will be impossible to repair it with original spare parts.

Very interested to hear your thoughts and fill in the gaps for me. I am sure if it was that simple Rolex would have done it a long time ago so I must be missing some thing.

[DeeTee]

How are you SkyDwelling but you still didn’t get the blue sky yet?

[SkyDwelling]

Originally Posted by DeeTee

How are you SkyDwelling but you still didn’t get the blue sky yet?

Wishful thinking buddy, wishful thinking

[nightmyth]

They can’t raise the price to gray levels just like how Sony can’t raise price of the PS5. And Rolex now already abandoned customer names on warranty cards, you can’t ascertain if the watch has been resold.

[SkyDwelling]

Originally Posted by nightmyth

And Rolex now already abandoned customer names on warranty cards, you can’t ascertain if the watch has been resold.

Din't know that. Thanks for the heads up.

What is the reason for this? A name on the card was at least one small measure to deter flipping. At least a small percentage of buyers would not want a watch with a strangers name on the card, including me.

[Danny83]

Im going to wear mine today


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[SkyDwelling]

Originally Posted by Danny83

Im going to wear mine today


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I hate you from the deepest pit of my heart

[TimeAZ]

Originally Posted by Danny83

Im going to wear mine today


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What a beautiful piece!!!

[/SALT]

[Bort]

Originally Posted by Danny83

Im going to wear mine today


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Nice watch!! Love it!

[garyk]

Flipping is out of control worldwide. Grey is here to stay. I’ve been waiting for some watches for a few years now and I have a history with at least two ADs. Imo, this is the basic law of supply and demand at play and there’s nothing anyone can do about it. At the beginning of the Pandemic, lots of statements here about prices going down soon and supplies going up. Nothing could have been further from the truth. Gold luck!

Just my opinions here from watching this Rolex experience since the 70s.

[Harry-57]

There are scores pf Sky Dwellers out there just waiting to be bought. If you can't accept the grey situation you can wait for your AD watch to turn up. If you can't accept the wait, buy something else. There is no point in punishing the world for something you can't have. It would piss the world off and you would still not have your Sky Dweller, since you won't pay the grey market value. Or would you in fact pay the grey market value if the MSRP was adjusted to track it?

[SkyDwelling]

Originally Posted by Harry-57

Or would you in fact pay the grey market value if the MSRP was adjusted to track it?

I would indeed pay that price if it becomes the official one. At least I would not be financing the gray market which is the reason for this suffering.

[Harry-57]

Originally Posted by SkyDwelling

I would indeed pay that price if it becomes the official one. At least I would not be financing the gray market which is the reason for this suffering.

It won't happen, but fair enough.

The other thing to take into consideration is all the watches that sell grey for less than MSRP. It may not affect Rolex, but what if?

In the mean time, this seems like a tendency to want to punish the whole industry because a few people want a Rolex and can't get it. Harsh.

[CashGap]

Originally Posted by SkyDwelling

I would indeed pay that price if it becomes the official one. At least I would not be financing the gray market which is the reason for this suffering.

The reason for the “suffering” (I laughed out loud reading that!) is a world that values the pieces at above the artificially low MSRP.

Not the free market that addresses that discrepancy.

Not everything you don’t like or don’t understand is bad.

[khazard]

If Rolex took the approach of increasing the price to whatever the market will bear, what happens when the winds change, and the demand for stainless steel sports models falls out of the stratosphere? They’d either have to reduce prices (which is a bad look for a “luxury” brand), or they’d become a brand that has to discount from those peak-demand retail prices (which is even worse).

Rolex probably cares more about its brand health twenty years from now than it does about next year’s profits or getting a Rolex on the wrist of every person who wants one. It’s true that the immediate backlash could be detrimental to the brand, but if luxury and exclusivity go together, the people that hate the exclusivity will also value the item even more when they finally get it.

I bought a black dial Sky Dweller for a few thousand dollars more than I would have paid retail because I got tired of the wait, and I don’t regret it for a second when I look at it on my wrist. Would I have preferred to get it at retail with the full AD experience? Sure. But I’m more interested in wearing the watch than having that experience.

[vh2k]

They are plenty of customers (tens of thousands every year) who get what they want at MSRP without waitlists, purchase histories, and all that nonsense.

Rolex doesn’t need to change a thing. Chances are... YOU DO!

Where are you, and who is your dealer?

[Monty22]

Yawn


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[Goin2drt]

Originally Posted by Monty22

Yawn


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Yep. All the experts out there.

[Ad11wrd]

Originally Posted by SkyDwelling

I began attempting to get a blue dial Sky Dweller in 2017 when the watch was announced and it has been nothing but unpleasantness. At different times I could have easily bought it gray market and I've always had the money for that but I chose not to on principle. Also because I want the experience I always had whenever I bought a Rolex. I used to be able to walk into an AD, find everything in stock (except the SS Daytona), buy a spanking new watch with my own name on the warranty then go home and enjoy removing the stickers and sizing it to my wrist. That's a part of the fun of buying a Rolex and I will not replace it with a gray market watch purchase.

For 4 years I contacted almost a hundred AD's. No one has my watch, no one would even put my name on a waiting list for one, and on occasion it would be implied that if I buy available watches it might be a good start for a "relationship" that might get me on a list. I do want the watch but nowhere am I desperate enough to spend tens of thousands on watches that I do not want in order to get it. This means that 4 years on I'm still unable to get the watch nor even have my name on a list. No problem, my life will not come to a halt because of a watch or any other piece of goods.

Still I don't understand why they haven't thought of certain measures to end this problem, and wanted to discuss it with you in case I was missing something. I don't believe the suggestion that Rolex wants this or loves it. If it did it wouldn't have instructed AD's to take extreme action to disrupt gray market such as cutting the tags, removing the stickers at the store, and keeping the warranty card for a year. Also if you look at Rolex social media you will see chaos. Every time Rolex makes a post it gets hundreds of negative replies from people complaining they can't get watches and telling stories of blackmail by AD's and such. No one wants that and Rolex can't be happy about this ongoing negativity on its social media.

I looked at secondary market sites and saw a great abundance of watches with extremely high mark ups. My desired Sky Dweller goes for 25 to 30 thousand that's more than double the price. It is the same on the bay. Hundreds of watches for double the price most brand new with stickers and warranties with recent dates. Thousands of people therefore get those watches without any intent to keep them and instead unload them for double the money immediately. Two ideas I think might fix this.

1st, why don't Rolex increase the prices of the watches to what ever people are paying for them gray market? If every watch made is happily bought by some one at a high mark up or double the price then why don't Rolex sell them for these exact prices? The speculators would then still buy the watches and sell them at triple the price? No problem Rolex raises the price again as long as people are willing to buy every last watch for that money from gray market. This should continue until the watches reach a price that no one wants to pay a dollar over and that would kill the grey market and Rolex would still sell every last watch made.

That sounds unfair to normal collectors who then have to pay three times the original price, but they could never have got the watches at the original price any way. If in order to get a desired watch at the original price one first must buy other undesirable watches that they can't sell for what they paid for, are they really getting the desired watches at that original price when they have lost a lot of money on other watches first?

2nd solution I was thinking about, is some thing like what car companies do. If you want to buy one of the limited hyper cars you can't sell it for a certain number of years or else you will be black listed and would never get another car from them. Why won't Rolex decide that only the person who's name is on the warranty can have any sort of service for a number of years after purchase? If some one else takes the watch to any AD for repair in that period the watch is rejected and it's serial gets black listed and the buyer would have to find another way to service it or get original parts for it. It might not end it completely but sure a person would hesitate to buy a gray market watch if he knows that for 7 years if the watch has a problem or gets damaged it will be impossible to repair it with original spare parts.

Very interested to hear your thoughts and fill in the gaps for me. I am sure if it was that simple Rolex would have done it a long time ago so I must be missing some thing.

ROLEX’s warranty cards have no name on them anymore.

[Delawareguy]

Relationships are everything. You need to build a relationship, one way is by spending money, the other is developing some kind of empathy for your situation. Figure out who you want to build a relationship and focus on that AD. Otherwise you are just another dude trying to score the golden ticket.

[Little machines]

Yes nice looking watch!!

[Fleetlord]

Oneitis strikes again. if you don't have interest in other watches to show the AD that you are a consistent buyer and you won't buy grey, then you will get shut out of that reference.

[Burlington]

Originally Posted by Fleetlord

Oneitis strikes again. if you don't have interest in other watches to show the AD that you are a consistent buyer and you won't buy grey, then you will get shut out of that reference.

Quite right

OP - would you honestly still refuse to buy from grey if the model you wanted was 50% less than MSRP?

[Pw92676]

Originally Posted by Fleetlord

Oneitis strikes again. if you don't have interest in other watches to show the AD that you are a consistent buyer and you won't buy grey, then you will get shut out of that reference.

Yes.

Dealers do not have a favorable view of clients who only want one particular reference from the brand (Daytona, Nautilus, RO, etc etc etc). I don’t blame them. One and done, go grey and be happy, no harm no foul. The “hot pieces” are reward pieces for a brand/AD to satiate their existing and loyal clientele. This is the way the system works and always should be IMO. The only travesty is that “hot pieces” have been so diluted that now it’s trickled down to OP41 and practically any steel model. That’s a shame but also not fully the brand/ADs fault.

[SeaDweller50]

You’d have to pay grey prices for 5 digits (like me, and many others) so I don’t see the difference. Whatever you pay at grey price you’ll be able to sell at grey price. More or less, especially if buying from a private seller.

[RyanJ]

Rolex does not need to fix anything. There is no problem. They produce watches, they sell all of them.

Rolex doesn't care if you get the watch you want. Their only care is brand image and right now that is doing just fine.

In my opinion, Rolex should do absolutely nothing.

[beshannon]

Originally Posted by RyanJ

Rolex does not need to fix anything. There is no problem. They produce watches, they sell all of them.

Rolex doesn't care if you get the watch you want. Their only care is brand image and right now that is doing just fine.

In my opinion, Rolex should do absolutely nothing.

Exactly

[Time4aRolex]

Originally Posted by RyanJ

Rolex does not need to fix anything. There is no problem. They produce watches, they sell all of them.

Rolex doesn't care if you get the watch you want. Their only care is brand image and right now that is doing just fine.

In my opinion, Rolex should do absolutely nothing.

This is totally true from Rolex’s perspective. They control stainless and sell everything they can make. Could the make incrementally more. Sure - but there is significantly more value to them in unobtainable.

Any watch is available in a few weeks. You just have to get beyond paying retail at an AD.

[Nairn1980]

Originally Posted by RyanJ

Rolex does not need to fix anything. There is no problem. They produce watches, they sell all of them.

Rolex doesn't care if you get the watch you want. Their only care is brand image and right now that is doing just fine.

In my opinion, Rolex should do absolutely nothing.

Absolutely spot on.

[Kevin of Larchmont]

Originally Posted by RyanJ

Rolex does not need to fix anything. There is no problem. They produce watches, they sell all of them.

Rolex doesn't care if you get the watch you want. Their only care is brand image and right now that is doing just fine.

In my opinion, Rolex should do absolutely nothing.

This answer is perfect.