Affordable Swiss Quality Watches:
So, gentlemen, unless you're an infamous rapper or perhaps a distant cousin of Liberace, the chances are that the only item of "jewellery" you feel comfortable wearing is the humble wristwatch. Sadly, "humble" is not a word that can readily be applied to many quality watches these days, with the most well-known Swiss watch houses like Rolex, Omega, Longines and Breitling, for example, charging thousands of pounds for their time-telling, mini-mechanical-marvels that will, nevertheless, spend much of their time hidden beneath shirt cuffs.
Many of these top quality brands take a very tough line when it comes to offering discounts so, if you're in the market for a new watch, haggling at an Authorised Dealer is unlikely to achieve very much (if anything) in the way of a saving. But the good news is that there are a number of other avenues you can explore to obtain a high quality watch at a reasonable price.
The first thing to consider is to buy pre-owned. I'm not talking about eBay here which, whilst you might get lucky and snag a genuine bargain, can be a real minefield for even the most experienced watch collector. Fakes abound! Rather, check out some of the established and respected dealers of pre-owned watches. The advantages of buying from one of these expert sources rather than an online auction site is that your watch will likely have been serviced, will be guaranteed to be in good order and will have been checked for authenticity. Some people don't like the idea of buying second-hand goods, but consider that some pre-owned watches are akin to classic cars and have real collectability. Some, particularly Rolex models, may even appreciate in value.
Take Austin Kaye, this well-established, highly regarded, bricks and mortar business located at 425 Strand, London WC2, has recently announced its intention to abandon sales of new watches and concentrate solely on selling pre-owned examples. They have a wide selection of well cared for, top quality watches ranging from Audemars Piguet to Zenith, all at significant savings on the new equivalents and all backed by an exemplary level of service from their friendly and knowledgeable staff. Other bricks and mortar businesses I can recommend investigating are Antique Watch Co. at 19 Clerkenwell Road, London EC1, and J. E. Allnutt and Son (otherwise known as Little Cogs) at West Street, Midhurst, West Sussex GU29.
Sometimes, even more savings can be made by buying from online-only retailers who don't have to cover the costs of owning bricks and mortar establishments. Examples with whom I've had nothing but good experiences are madaboutwatches.co.uk and poshtime.com, now both run by Robin Armstrong. These have a regularly changing inventory of terrific and highly-collectable pre-owned watches ranging in price from around £50 to well over £1000.
Keep an eye on the listings that these dealers advertise and you will find many watches being offered for significantly less than a new equivalent and occasionally you will even find a real classic at a bargain price!
If the idea of a pre-owned watch doesn't appeal and you want to buy new, then there are other ways of getting discounts from dealers. One way is to see if any of the high street jewellers or other retailers are publishing discount codes or money-off vouchers. The simplest way of checking this is to use one of the online discount code web sites such as CodeFerret. Try a search for watches and see if there are any voucher codes, coupons or other deals available that might get you a discount off your desired watch.
A third strategy is to buy from a less well known brand that doesn't have to
charge a fortune for its watches to supplement any extravagant advertising and
marketing campaigns, thereby passing these savings on to the consumer. Three good examples
are RLT Watches,
Timefactors and
Ollech and Wajs (O&W).
RLT, based in Yorkshire UK, is run by Roy Taylor and was opened as a bricks and mortar business in 1987 but, since 2001, has been online only. RLT watches are hand-assembled in the UK from quality components with some models featuring dials made by Roy himself. Timefactors, run by Eddie Platts in Sheffield UK, was established in 1996 selling quality watches on the net and today specialises in commissioning high quality military homages which are manufactured in Switzerland. Eddie has even successfully revived some traditional brand names from the past such as Precista, Sewills and Smiths.
With both RLT and Timefactors you can expect a very high standard of personal service. Bear in mind though that many of the models offered by these two companies are produced in very small numbers (sometimes as few as ten pieces, or less) so if you see something you like, buy it quick before it sells out. Whatever model you buy, you're pretty much guaranteed to be wearing something very special that you're unlikely to see on anyone else's wrist. I can also recommend both of the Internet forums associated with these companies. thewatchforum.co.uk (RLT) and tz-uk.com (Timefactors) have a wealth of knowledgeable members who are happy to help with questions and talk watches all day long. If you contribute to the forums in a worthwhile fashion you will be able to participate in the Sales sections where watches often change hands at "collector to collector" prices. A gentle warning though; do not spam either of these forums with posts like "Wow, nice watch!" as this will not win you any friends and may even get you banned.
And so to Ollech and Wajs. O&W began life in 1956 as a partnership between Joseph Ollech and Albert Wajs, offering rugged, Swiss-made sports watches at affordable prices. The Internet wasn't around at that time, of course, but O&W took the then unusual step of offering watches direct to the USA market via mail order where they proved to be something of a hit. A decade later, O&W's military watch models became particularly popular with US soldiers in Vietnam. O&W Watches are available today direct from Mr. Wajs' official web site.
Happy bargain watch hunting!