Thoughts on the watch industry from a high profile AD

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This was posted on Hodinkee earlier today:

I work for a high profile, world renowned Authorised dealer that, I think, has a reputation for honesty and integrity in terms of how we deal with clients especially in regards to sought after watches.

I have worked in the industry for 12 years and I can say, hand on heart, that the last 12 months has been the worst experience in my career. We look after clients that have been loyal (not interms of spend but people that take the time to build a relationship and that we can trust aren’t flipping pieces for a quick profit). However, we also sell sought after pieces to people who are first time purchasers and we do it simply on how we feel about the customer. Why has the last 12 months been so bad? We do a footfall count and a tally for requests for “hot pieces” (Aquanaut, Nautilus, Sports Professional Rolex) and I’ll give you an example. Last Saturday we had 94 people walk in. 79 asked for hot pieces. This is the trend not the exception. I spend 85% of my time explaining to people the sheer demand vs the paltry supply. It is incredibly demoralising to speak to people who come in and ask “do you have ANY sports pieces?” You know they are looking to flip, hundreds of people a week looking for a quick profit. Most people are incredibly rude and some are even outraged that I can’t produce a steel Daytona on the spot. It’s absolutely soul destroying. I can also say that other retailers that I have worked for, absolutely take advantage of the situation. They are definitely selling to the grey market and it perpetuates the problem. The watch industry has become toxic and unfortunately it is the many not the few that are responsible.

We have to judge, not on who is “worth it” but who we think is a genuine collector. If an AD is found to be selling too many watches to grey market flippers they gets reduced allocation or even they are threatened by losing their Rolex account. For most retailers losing Rolex is a death sentence.

Rolex have definitely purposely withheld on supply. Even at previous manufacture numbers it wouldn’t be able to keep up with the sheer demand. It’s sad that people all want exactly the same watches, there is so much variety out there. Customers just don’t have as much imagination as they used to.

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