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From The Escapement: “There’s no good way to buy a Rolex - So maybe just don’t”:
Sometimes, rarely, someone will ask for thoughts about that once in a lifetime watch, the watch, and almost without fail they mean a Rolex. Which one should they get, where should they go to get it, what about this versus that color or metal etc.
My response is always the same: Do you have to?
Because maybe there is a right Rolex for you, but there is no good way to buy it. And while there are plenty of Rolexes I’d wear with joy, there are exactly none I would spend my money on right now, or yours.
Let me explain.
Over the last 20 odd years, Rolexes have shot up in value, even while the sticker prices haven’t gone up nearly as fast. There’s a combination of reasons. Part of it is people have worked out that watches actually hold their value remarkably well when, say, the housing market crashes the economy, or inflation goes nuts, or those crypto cartoon NFTs take a beating. As a result, the used/antique (or, if you want to sound like a tosser, “vintage”) market has exploded, and demand in general has soared.
The other big reason is that demand for Western luxury status goods in Asia has gone stratospheric in the last quarter century, in no small part thanks to the big bang of the Chinese economy. Ballers in Macau like shiny nice things just as much as hedge fund bros in New York.
In all cases, Rolex has been top of people’s shopping lists. And they’ve sold out—literally. You cannot walk into a store and just buy a Rolex. Anywhere…
Their Swiss factory can only kick out about a million watches a year, that’s just the max volume. Why don’t they just build another factory? Man power. They aren’t making Ford Explorers over there, and hand assembling a Swiss watch of any quality, let alone for the crown, is a technical vocation that requires a full blown education and apprenticeship. And there’s a labor shortage. The kids just aren’t signing up to be horologists anymore.
Rolex simply can’t expand their production volume to the size of, say, Omega, without changing how they make their product and lowering quality. That’s the bind.
All this is why it’s hard to buy a Rolex. But it isn’t why there’s no good way to do it.
There are only two ways you can buy a Rolex: at retail from one of Rolex’s authorized dealers, or on the gray market, trading in “used” products. I’ll get to the scare quotes in a minute.
Rolex ADs are, and I don’t want to generalize here, a smarmy pack of thieving bastards, and they are absolutely coining it off the current product shortage.
Say you go into your local fancy jewelry store. They have a big Rolex sign out front to let you know they’re in the magic circle of ADs and you think “Great, a Rolex shop. I want to buy a Rolex, so I will go in and buy one.”
You fool. You’re about to be condescended to by the worst kind of charlatan. Tell them that you’re there to buy a Rolex and they will sneer smugly at you like you’re a freshman college kid who just walked into a bar and said “I’d like to order one alcohol, please.”
They may just scoff at you for your presumption. Or, if they decide you look like you might actually have a couple of grand to spend, they’ll give you the talk.
They will congratulate you on your evident taste and discernment, and they will tell you how honored they are to “start with you on your journey” towards owning a Rolex. They’ll show you all the nice pictures of the different models; maybe, if you’re really lucky, they’ll still have a display model they haven’t sold out the side door and they’ll let you hold it for a minute.
Then, when you actually suggest you’d like to buy one, you know, now, they will explain that, of course, there is a waitlist for these prize trophies of refinement, but they’d be glad to add your name to it.
How long is the list? Who can say, sir, it really just depends on so many imponderables.
Then they will start talking about “building a relationship” with you, at which point you should immediately feel your cheeks tense up.
In what other circumstance do you walk into a shop and ask to buy the product they advertise over their door and they start talking to you about needing to date a while before they give it up?
Don’t be fooled though, this isn’t a courtship and you aren’t wooing them; you’re being warned that you’re the one about to get screwed.
What it boils down to is this: If you want to get to the top of the waiting list, you better spend some money.
Doesn’t matter how they make it, the pitch will come eventually. Ask why you’ve been waiting months for that watch you ordered and you’ll eventually get some version of “Maybe sir would consider this nice Tudor while you wait, or maybe sir’s significant other has a birthday coming up and you’d like to see some diamonds?”
That’s how you “build a relationship” with a Rolex AD: You pay the chiseling spiv to move up the list by buying his other wares. It’s outrageous, and it’s 100% the reason you want to be a Rolex AD these days.
Now, Rolex doesn’t get anything out of this, and it wasn’t the point of the AD network to begin with. In the days when you could buy a Submariner as easily as a Seamaster, the point was to make sure the dealers were actually reputable and not selling BS goods. This sort of bollocks is purely a result of the recent boom in demand and scarcity of product.
Would I max out my credit card and buy the new Air-King for $7,400 if I saw one in a shop window? In a red hot second. But am I willing to crawl and scrape and wheedle and beg and PAY for the privilege of waiting in line to drop thousands of dollars? Hell no.
And neither should you.
Exactly right. Just who do these ADs think they are to ask customers like us to beg them for a product we want? Such scummy practices actually tarnish the reputation of Rolex, because these ADs are representing Rolex on the frontlines of the marketplace. It also makes me not want to give that AD my business, nor have anything to do with Rolex.
Rolex didn’t create this problem with the ADs, and they aren’t making anything off of it. But Rolex is aware of it, and they’ve done exactly Jackie Chan about it, and that’s on them.
So, in the meantime, if you want to buy a Rolex on your own schedule and without having to grease some oily shopkeeper for the privilege, you’re going to be headed into the gray market and, while I do most of my shopping and make most of my recommendations from there, I wouldn’t buy a Rolex there either.
For a start, you are going to pay. A lot.
Starting price for that new Air-King on Chrono24 right now is around $15K—double the retail price. Granted if I wanted it fast, the AD would probably have charged me that much too, but I’d have a new Black Bay and a nice Tag Monaco to show for my pain. On the gray market it’s pure Goodfellas economics.
You wanna watch? F*** you. Pay me.
And that’s if you’re buying from a “reputable” professional dealer who’s selling you a legit watch, with the original box and papers, and who probably got the thing new from an AD and he’s just marking it up 100% for pure profit. I wonder how they make it to the top of the AD waiting lists. Who can say?
If you’re buying a truly used Rolex from some guy, even on sites that do good work keeping money in escrow and posting transaction feedback, there’s a whole world of stuff to be afraid of. Such is the premium on Rolex and genuine Rolex parts these days that single bracelet links or tiny internal screws can sell for hundreds of dollars, and there’s just no way of knowing, short of buying the watch and taking it apart, if it’s been partially cannibalized.
Like I said, there’s no good way to buy a Rolex.
Rolex is one of the most counterfeited brands in the world. I say this, having been to China, the counterfeit capital of the world, where in many a shop in sketchy back alleys, lured by shady characters, tourists can buy the latest knock-off versions of top-tier luxury goods, watches included. That “Rolex” they offer for next to nothing? Brass-plated, cheap quartz or Chinese-made mechanical movement, which will probably stop working after a day or two, and the strap or bracelet will fall apart shortly thereafter. This is exactly what happened to a classmate of mine, when he knowingly bought a fake Franck Muller watch, just to see how bad the knockoffs can be.
With all that being said, if you absolutely must have a Rolex in your collection, and you want to buy one that is pre-owned, then be extremely careful where you buy.
Something else to think about: Most people don’t really care what kind of watch you’re wearing. They just don’t. And why should they? They’ve got their own problems, concerns, and interests to occupy their thoughts and focus. Over 99% of the time, none of those happen to be “Gosh, I wonder what type of watch this stranger or other person I might know is wearing?” The best you can hope for is a “Huh, that’s nice” if they happen to notice you wearing a Rolex. The worst you can expect is either “What a pretentious jerk!” to “Give me your watch and wallet!” (The latter likely involving the business end of a firearm or knife pointed at you)
That’s something else many people do not consider, is that wearing a Rolex (and sometimes, any type of expensive-looking watch) can make you a target for thieves, scam artists, and other criminals. It has happened to many a poor soul who wandered in to the wrong part of town, or got caught in a big city late at night. It can even happen in the posh, tony parts of major cities. One example is the late actor James Gandolfini, star of “The Sopranos,” who passed away from a heart attack whilst resting in his room at a five-star hotel in Rome. Initial media reports said that someone, possibly hotel staff, had stolen his gold Rolex watch, along with other personal items, between the time he was discovered unconscious and when he was taken to hospital and pronounced dead.
More recently, in his YouTube videos, Adrian Barker, founder of BarkAndJack.com, has stated that he no longer wears his Rolexes when he is in London, the implication being that London has become too dangerous for people to be seen wearing expensive jewelry or clothing.
Don’t get me wrong: I’m not saying Rolex doesn’t make a great watch, or that I wouldn’t love a Milguass with the green crystal. I absolutely would. And if you’re going into the process with eyes open and your heart is set, follow your bliss and God bless.
But if you just want a really nice watch and think this means it’s got to be a Rolex, I’d strongly encourage you to look elsewhere. It’ll cost you less, in so many ways. And in some cases you can actually get a hell of a lot more watch for your money…
There’s a lot of reasons to want a Rolex. And there are a lot of Rolexes worth wanting. And I think I have been fair here—I am not saying you shouldn’t want one, or that they aren’t often value for money at retail.
I’m just saying, on balance, they aren’t worth the bull**** you have to go through to get the one you want 90 percent of the time. And, as often as not, there’s a better watch out there for a lot less.
If you just want a watch that looks as much like a Rolex as possible, doesn’t cost nearly as much, has a decent movement and an ugly hour hand, and people won’t give you s*** about it being a knock off, skip all this and just buy a Tudor.
There’s no shame in that.
It’s funny to hear how, when presented with the choice of a Rolex or the Tudor equivalent, many or even most people will actually choose the Tudor. The designs are more reminiscent of classic Rolexes, whilst maintaining modern levels of quality and accuracy. For Tudor, many of their older models from decades gone by were barely-rebadged Rolexes, with off-the-shelf ETA movements instead of in-house Rolex movements.
But how did Tudor get its start, and what is its relation to Rolex? From Bob’s Watches:
In 1926, Swiss watchmaker Veuve de Philippe Hüther (which means “Widow of Philippe Hüther” since the wife took over after her husband died) trademarked the name “The Tudor” and Hans Wilsdorf struck a deal for the exclusive rights to the name.
By 1932, the first Tudor signed watches made their appearance and were sent to the Australian market. The watches were rectangular in shape with beveled edges. Some pieces even included the Rolex name along with Tudor on the dial to make the association clear. Some dials also included the name “Catanach’s” – one of Australia’s oldest jewelers and a retailer of Tudor watches during that time.
Encouraged by the brand’s potential, Hans Wilsdorf acquired “The Tudor” name from Veuve de Philippe Hüther in 1936. And as a marketing man, he added the famed Tudor Rose inside a shield to the logo (the traditional floral symbol of England derived from the emblem of the Royal House of Tudor) to spruce things up.
After WWII, Hans Wilsdorf created the “Montres TUDOR S.A.” company in 1946, with the understanding that Rolex would play a big part in the company’s manufacturing and distribution. This relationship between the two brands explains the parallels between the watches Rolex and Tudor released throughout their respective histories.
Under the new Montres Tudor banner and armed with a refreshed rose logo sans shield, the company released a slew of new watch models starting in the mid-20th Century. The waterproof and automatic Tudor Oyster Prince made its debut in 1952, and the Tudor Oyster Prince Submariner dive watch joined the catalog in 1955. The Tudor Advisor alarm watch and ultra-slim Tudor Oysterthin soon followed in 1957.
The sixties and seventies saw the arrival of the Tudor Oyster Prince Ranger (1967), the Oyster Prince Date+Day (1969), the manual Tudor Oysterdate chronograph (1970), and the self-winding Tudor Oysterdate “Automatic Chrono Time” chronographs (1976). It’s also important to note that in 1969, Tudor redesigned the face of the Oyster Prince Submariner dive watches to include large square-shaped luminous hour markers and matching square-tipped hour hands – these specific Tudor hands are collectively known as “Snowflake hands” today.
When Tudor celebrated its 50th anniversary in 1996, the company decided it was high time to shed Rolex signed components (such as cases, winding crowns, and bracelets) in favor of Tudor branded ones. The 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s saw Tudor add more models to its already established collections. However, perhaps due to less-than-stellar sales and brand equity, sometime in the late 1990s/early 2000s, Tudor watches stopped being sold in the American (and other) markets.
Refreshed, rebranded, and refocused, Tudor announced its return to U.S. shores in 2013 – and what a return it has been! As they say, timing is everything, and Tudor’s value-driven proposition (while still having the illustrious Rolex name attached to it) fits perfectly into today’s booming watch enthusiast culture.
The majority of modern Tudor watches draw design cues from their archives but have been updated with larger cases, in-house movements, and contemporary materials. They take the best parts of Tudor’s history and repackage them for the modern watch fan at prices that are not cheap per se, but certainly reachable.
Buying a Tudor watch is effectively buying 80-90% of a Rolex at about 30-40% of the price, which makes it a killer value proposition for me. Given the shenanigans that Rolex ADs pull these days, the long waiting lists, and the crazy high prices for both new and used models, I will gladly choose a Tudor over a Rolex any day.
If you are thinking of adding a Tudor to your watch collection, which should you buy? You have a few choices, starting with the popular Black Bay and Black Bay 58 series:
There’s also the amazing Black Bay GMT:
Another great GMT watch in Tudor’s lineup is the Black Bay Pro:
One of the newest additions to Tudor’s range in 2022 is the new Ranger, which is an excellent field watch, and Rolex Explorer alternative:
Then there is the Tudor Black Bay Chrono, which shares a movement with Breitling:
While Rolex’s Datejust and especially Day-Date complication watches can be more expensive than even Submariners and Explorers, with Tudor’s Royal, Glamour, and Style, they are the exact opposite:
Finally, there is the criminally underappreciated Tudor 1926:
What do you think? When given the choice between a Rolex and a Tudor, would you choose the Tudor over the Rolex? Subscribe and comment down below, and let me know your thoughts.