A Look Ahead To 2025 – Part 2 With Mark and Rich¶
Published on Fri, 27 Dec 2024 18:00:00 +0000
Considering what comes next for some of our favorite watches and the leading brands.
Synopsis¶
In this final episode of Hodinkee Radio for 2024, host James Stacey is joined by editor and photographer Mark Kauzlarich and editor Rich Fordon to discuss predictions and hopes for the watch industry in 2025. The conversation begins with reflections on whether vintage-inspired designs will continue to dominate, with the team agreeing that while heritage remains important, the industry needs more genuinely new and creative designs rather than repetitive releases.
A significant portion of the discussion focuses on pricing concerns, with all three acknowledging that watch prices have increased faster than many consumers can absorb, creating heightened price sensitivity. They discuss psychological pricing barriers and how brands could be more strategic about respecting certain price points to maintain customer satisfaction. The team then takes a "CEO for a day" approach, discussing what they would do with major brands like Tudor, Rolex, Patek Philippe, Cartier, and Swatch. For Tudor, they advocate for more conventional colorways rather than the brand's tendency toward gilt and fauxtina that seems designed to avoid competing directly with Rolex. For Rolex, they suggest more attention to everyday wearability rather than extreme professional specifications. With Patek Philippe, the consensus is simplification of the lineup and either a high-end time-only piece with exceptional finishing or a more accessible Calatrava entry point.
The conversation also covers Cartier's respectful approach to heritage, particularly at the CPCP level, with hopes that similar design philosophy could extend to more accessible price points. Regarding Swatch, they discuss the success of the MoonSwatch phenomenon and speculate on future collaborations, with creative suggestions including a minute repeater Swatch and partnerships with brands like Richard Mille or Hublot. The episode concludes with anticipation for Watches and Wonders 2025, which is expected to be more exciting than 2024's "build year," though Rich warns that the shaped watch trend may be reaching its saturation point in the market.
Links¶
Transcript¶
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| James Stacey | Welcome back to another episode of Hodinki Radio. Today's episode of the show is sponsored by our friends at Brooklotty, the award-winning whiskey from Isla, who we have partnered with here at Hodinki for the last couple of years. Stay tuned for an update later in the show on what we're up to this season. Hello and welcome to another Hodinky Radio episode. It's actually our last episode of the year and the fourth in our year-end series. So we did two looking back at 2024. We did two looking forward to 2025. I've already recorded, and you'll be able to see the one with uh Malika and Tantan. Uh check that out on YouTube or certainly on the site. Um, but check out the previous episodes for sure, and now we've got the final episode of the year and I,'ve got editor and photographer Mark Koslerich and editor Rich Fordon joining me today to chat all about uh kind of what we think of 2025, what we're excited about, what we're kind of concerned about, where we think things are going. Guys, uh, you know, we spent the last episode with you two really chatting about what it looked like the trends had been for the last year. I'm interested in what you what your sort of predictions are, even at sort of a broad level, if there's something from this year that you think won't work next year, something we'll see more of next year, if there's a play that feels you know, I feel like the playbook for the last several years has been vintage inspired design for a lot of watch brands. Does that playbook still feel relevant? Do we think there's a new one? Where do you guys land on this? Maybe uh Rich, you want to you want to take it away |
| Rich Fordon | ? Yeah, thanks, James. Um I had lots of questions in there. I think the topic on vintage re-releases are inspiration. Um, we're seeing things that have a bit of vintage inspiration already, but are moving things forward. Um, I think the industry as a whole is lacking in new designs, and some of the smaller brands are coming in with vintage-inspired things that feel very, very new. So it doesn't have to be like an RM or some crazy Hublow to be a new fresh design to the watch world. I mean there's a lot of like open space to run in when you look at watches. So um I would expect continual tying to heritage product with brand story and product story, but offering something that's truly different and trying to move things forward, um, which I think the watch world could use a lot of |
| James Stacey | . How about you, Mark? What do you think? You feel similar |
| Mark Kauzlarich | ? Yeah, I mean you a you asked |
| Rich Fordon | what I was concerned about. Um I don't |
| Mark Kauzlarich | know that we have enough enough time for that, and I don't know that it's on topic for this podcast. But in the end of |
| James Stacey | the we could this could also just be air the airing of the grievances |
| Mark Kauzlarich | . Let's let's just get into it. Now um lights |
| James Stacey | a cigarette. |
| Rich Fordon | Um I mean |
| Mark Kauzlarich | I I have similar sort of general |
| Mark Kauzlarich | concerns. I I don't know that Rich framed them as concerns, but like there' there iss so much repetition and um you know I think a lot of people might be surprised at the number of um you know cold emails and pitches and messages to my uh Instagram and messages to my personal email, which I specifically the only place it's listed, I specifically say don't send watch pitches to this email, but people still do it anyway. And I would say like eighty percent of them look the same. It's it's hard to imagine that when we see things like Burneron or other brands coming out with creative things, and I think that's great and necessary, but it's so hard because you don't want to be mean to people that are trying really hard and doing something new, but it's hard to for me to sit and look at somebody and find a way to say like your dive watch that looks like everybody else's dive watch isn't maybe necessarily the thing that the market needs right now or might not be successful. I I do have a concern as we talk about like the trends of the market uh economically and and a lot of like hemming and hawing about downtrends and prices going down. I'm a little worried about um how many micro brands, smaller brands like this, brands that aren't bringing something unique to the table will survive in twenty twenty-five. Um, so not to start out or end the year on a depressing note, but that's something that I've been thinking about for a while. |
| James Stacey | Yeah. I think that's a that's a an interesting concern. And I I think there's a couple examples here of like things that I predicted years ago that of course I was just like dead wrong. I thought that we would have been totally tired by the vintage trend now and instead we have a major brand relaunching U Universal Genève. Clearly we're not tired of this, uh as as a whole. Maybe it works better with UG because they're they straddle the line with some sporty elements but very dressy as well versus, you know, a purely sort of mid century sport watch brand. And then at the same time, I I think I also said that, yeah, probably twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen, I thought it was going to be a pretty tough out time out there for micro brands, especially those in the, you know, the budget categories, the Kickstarter brands, things like that. And it feels like they've also enjoyed uh quite a bump in the in the resulting years from uh the increase in attention during the pandemic, but then also into what we've seen post pandemic with uh kind of a lot of price sensitivity bringing more focus to these brands that are able to make a watch that people can be excited about for fifteen hundred bucks or less, something like that |
| Mark Kauzlarich | . Yeah. Now now that price |
| Mark Kauzlarich | sort of that that price point has moved up a little bit, I think, you know, it's it is harder to keep things under fifteen hundred dollars. We were we were talking about this for year end recaps is you know, give me a couple extra hundred dollars and I can find something pretty good. But that budget mark is is harder to meet. I I do have I have a question for Rich actually as somebody that pays attention to the vintage market, secondary market, um these sort of revival brands and stuff. I assume that twenty twenty five will finally be the year of Urban Jurgensen. Um we've been waiting for a while. We missed I think the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary. I still see a lot of them come up for market, a lot of dealers asking about them, Carol posting Urban Jurgensen all the time, a collected man just posted one. Is that a sign that there's still demand? Is it people trying to get ahead of hype by like gathering resources and holding on to them or do you think Urban Jurgensen is gonna actually have like a a pretty successful launch when it happens |
| Rich Fordon | ? Yeah, I think it gets into a topic of like how brands are doing relaunches or Urban Jurgensen is a vintage inspired brand whenever Kari decides to come out with it, which you will never hold him to a date, as we've learned. But what I like to think of for vintage inspired brands, and this gets into UG as well, is that like the Long Jeans playbook from twenty fourteen, twenty fifteen is Ben played and does not work anymore. Like they did a great job. They were probably the best big brand to bring back the Heritage line that was super inspired by things and make it a little bit bigger, make it wearable, make it palatable to their customer, which is a more consumer level customer, but also draw in the attention from enthusiasts who maybe can't find that vintage thing or think it's a bit too small. Um I think that playbook's done. I don't want UG to do that playbook. Nobody does, but it's still a very, very fine line to walk. Um we'll see what UG does, obviously. Uh they've already done one watch, which is in very low quantities, which is more of that one-to-one playbook, but I understand that's not the direction going forward, which I'm almost I'm glad to hear. You know, I'd rather you see that name be used as something to move watches forward with a great heritage to tie to rather than just hey you don't want to go on eBay and buy a UG, you can walk into a store now. How about that? Like I don't want that. Nobody wants that. On the urban Jurgensen topic, um you know interest is still growing. Uh Rose Gold reference three just did, I think, 65 at Phillips or Sotheby's in New York. Um, which is a really good number for that watch. I think that's the number they should sit at. It's a perpetual calendar. It's really, really amazingly finished from the dial hands and case perspective. But I think there's a bit of speculation going on. The interesting thing about Urb Urban Jurgensen to me is the man that owned or was very involved in the brand. He didn't. Um, Peter Baumgunner did, but his best friend was Dr. Helmut Krapp, who is still very active in the watch scene. I was in Geneva. Um, the first night I was there, I was shown by someone actually works for a collective man, a what was told to me as a unique white gold reference three, which is when you find them in white metal, it's most often platinum. Um, and he was showing it to a couple of people around this party I was at, and I was like, that's really cool. I wrote a whole story about reference twos and threes, never saw one in White Gold before, ran into Helmut Kraut the next night. And he's like, oh yeah, we made like 10, 15 of those. I don't remember exactly how many, but definitely not unique. So it's interesting when vintage collecting gets this point of like when whenever we think about truths in vintage collecting, it's always like in this distant past, which you can never know. It's almost like archaeology, but with Urban Jurgensen, but the guy who bought the backstock and all the archives is like still around. So you can ask him, which I think actually can kind of hurt a brand when information is super set in stone like that, or you know, whether he's willing to give it or not, it was just to me in conversation. He might not even like me sharing it here. But um as a collecting sort of community, I think it's better for the market when things are a bit more like Rolex than they are PATTEC, where it's like, yeah, you know, this case and this dial come from the same year. Let's accept that that's correct. Whereas PATTEC, it's like if it's not on the extract, that's not your dial. Um, which Urban U Erbanergenson should it sort of mature a ton that style of collecting um is probably more towards the Patek side of things where we know what the watches were when they were first made. Um when I look at Carrie's relaunch, I tried to get information out of him when I wrote that article, I think it was about a year ago. |
| Mark Kauzlarich | I've tried many times, so don't don't worry that you didn't get much. |
| Rich Fordon | Even so much as like are you going to use the same lugs which are very unique on Urban Jurgensons from the 90s that I love so much. Like the very small like turtle lugs, but super, super tiny teardrops. And he was like, Yeah, I won't even say that much. So I mean, we'll see the direction. Uh the Gillchet dials that were in Urban Newson made by Derek Pratt and his team probably will be carried through Tikari's iteration because that's, you know, also his specialty, but beyond that, I'm I'm just waiting and seeing and I'm not gonna I'm not setting a calendar um reminder for that one. We'll see |
| James Stacey | . Again special thanks to our partners at Brooklady for the support of Hodinky Radio. This holiday season, we've partnered with Brookladie on a special giveaway that you can learn all about in the link in the article below or in the notes for this episode. You might be surprised at what you see, and you most definitely don't want to miss it. And now back to the show. One thing that we touched on uh while getting into the Urban Jurgensen line there was pricing of watches these days. Do you guys think that there's a pricing problem? I think we definitely see it in the comments where pretty much any watch comes out at on almost any price and the pushback is like, hey, I'm interested in this, but like why this number? And there's a a a new level of price sensitivity that comes from the level of inflation and other things we've been experiencing outside of just watch pricing. But it I think it also has an effect on watch pricing. And I think that in many ways it feels as though pricing has kind of outstripped uh the normal kind of growth that pricing can go through over a period of time. Where do you guys land on on pricing? Because value still feels okay, but there's definitely examples of stuff that feel real spicy |
| Mark Kauzlarich | . It it's tough to say because uh there's one watch in particular that I talk about a ton. I every time I look at their website, it seems like, yep, we can get an extra $500 out of you. We can get another $500 out of you. And I like I look away for two seconds, I come back and it's five hundred dollars more. Um, and that's not really how it is, but when you set in your mind, like, oh, this was good at you know, ten thousand one hundred and then it's ten thousand five hundred and then it's uh eleven thousand the last time I looked at uh this watch and it was it's the SLGW003, the manual line Grand Seiko. That's crept up. |
| James Stacey | Yeah. And it literally just came out this |
| Mark Kauzlarich | year. So I was a little I was a little surprised at that. But then there's also I think the hardest thing maybe for some people, first of all, like understanding that your frame of reference for what a watch is worth is formed when you start looking at that watch and maybe if the watch or that framework of watches, whether it's speedmasters have been out for ages and some people have been looking at speedmasters for 10 years and thinking, oh, you know, Speedmaster should be X price and now it's X plus two or three thousand dollars. Um, you're gonna feel that that hit for the pricing a lot more. And then the other side of it too is when you compare against other people in the market or even within the brand, I think it becomes very easy to become very price sensitive and a little surprised. Um, I I mentioned maybe to you, James, the other day, but I was going through the Rolex catalog and I did not realize that there's only like a $600 delta between a date submariner and a GMT. And that starts to feel a little strange as well. Like, shouldn't the GMT be significantly more complicated? Shouldn't it be I don't know if it's a GMT should feel more expensive or a submariner should feel more like a more entry level budget option or something like that, a little more value in there. |
| James Stacey | But um I think people |
| Mark Kauzlarich | are paying a lot of attention to all of those little things and any little movement, any little thing that you can pick up on in terms of pricing feels really big lately. |
| James Stacey | We're also just seeing new watches come out at what feels like more than they would have come out at a cut just a couple of years ago. So it's not just the progressive percentage added onto a line of successfully working watches. These like new watches come in and you go like, W,ell okay, I guess that's the price. Like |
| Mark Kauzlarich | the Speedmaster that uh I wrote about the pilot speedmaster. I think people were sort of surprised at the price on that. And it's what I it's sort of what I was alluding to when when you're used to a speedmaster of some sort being worth, you know, maybe say under eight thousand dollars. And a new one comes out and all of a sudden it's significantly more than that, even though there's nothing uh you know that you can do a direct one to one correlation for a new model. Even if there's small changes like mechanical, this one's an automatic, it has Andrometers of water resistance or whatever, but you you've sort of already framed your expectation of what a a a speed master can be. And even though those have now crept up over eight thousand dollars, you know, something that's getting closer to ten just feels really sort of outside um what you're used to. Whether or not it's a good value for the specs or whatever. |
| James Stacey | Yeah. Rich, what do you figure |
| Mark Kauzlarich | ? Yeah, I think |
| Rich Fordon | on the modern watch side obviously is what we're talking about here, where the brands let me down a lot of times is that I I do not think that these large modern brands are hurting for margin. Um so yes, you can give them excuses of inflation costs being higher. Um and they just pass those right on to consumers without wanting to I mean, with wanting to sort of maintain their previous margins, which we don't know for a lot of brands, but I I know they're they're very healthy, right? Like, I would like to see a bit more respect of price bans by the brands to not push themselves out of something just because costs are rising given macroeconomic factors. I can come to this question from like I used to work on the shop side and be more on the merchandising and buying side and I can give credit to a former colleague, Sauri O'Mura here. Um she was a master at pricing when we did our vintage drops and we would have conversations all the time of this is a great watch. It has to be under seven because once you creep over seven, even if it's seventy two hundred dollars that you're asking, you're asking someone to spend 10,000. You know, it there's certain barriers in watch pricing where it starts to become feeling like you're spending more. And if you keep it under those barriers, it feels like you're spending less. For example, like 38 is way closer to spending three grand than it is to spending five grand mentally, even though you're spending five grand, like after tax after everything. Um, there are these certain and it I excuse me if I'm getting a bit too high-minded, but we used to think about it a lot is like what is the psychological process of somebody clicking that buy button? And if we can move the price a couple hundred dollars and make someone feel a lot better about their purchase, then that's not a return. That's also a happy customer. You know, like there are certain things that you can do specifically on the we would do that work on the buy side with the seller and say, hey, can we knock 100 bucks off this price? We want to keep it under here so it sells quickly and we have a happy customer. Brands can do that too, where they say we're gonna give up a hundred dollars, two hundred dollars of margin to make our customer feel bit better by keeping a speedy, what is it, under seven grand instead of a little bit over? Like that's a big barrier. Am I right there? I think last time I checked speedy pricing, but |
| Mark Kauzlarich | plus or minus a thousand, I think. But yeah. |
| Rich Fordon | Yeah. I mean the same psych a lot like psychology can apply to the difference between seven and eight. You know. Those, especially when you're under 10 grand, it's very, very sensitive, even a couple hundred bucks. Um, and I would like to see brands respect that further. I don't think they need to, I don't think they will, but I'll just call it out and say |
| James Stacey | No, I I and I like I like the position of like making the recommendation essentially, like you you this is something people should be focusing on. I I just think you know there's eras everything's a a push and a pull, right? The swing of the pendulum. And there's eras where price sensitivity is very low, 2021, 2022, and there's eras where it's quite high. And and I think you know a lot of us can remember even like 2015, 2014, uh we saw a lot like a lot of kind of adjustments to the market in terms of pricing and that sort of thing. And I I'm I'm definitely curious to continue on this trend of like how we might approach these sorts of things. So, like just for fun, for 2025, you're going to be, and we've got a handful of brands I've got on a list here, the CEO of a brand. What would you do to kind of like fine-tune something that feels like it would be a good move for 2025? Why don't we kick it off with like a brand that absolutely crushed it in 24 with Tudor? If you guys were if you guys were going to be in charge of Tudor for the year or whatever, would you just carry on the same? Is it more Formula One? Is it less Formula One? Is it more Pelagos, which has definitely been in the playbook for the last year? Or is it less now that that line's quite uh broad? Uh what do you guys think? |
| Rich Fordon | I I have some hopes and Tudor's an |
| Mark Kauzlarich | interesting one because I I feel like every once in a while they give you exactly what you want. Um I think the Black Bay monochrome was kind of that, and it it was sort of proof that it's okay for them to run into Rolex a little bit. I think there's been some skittishness the last few years of of tutor being like we don't want to come too close to giving you a perfect version of the Rolex, you can't get. Um, so let's give you something that has a little bit of uh oddity or variety. We still saw that this year. The the Black Bay 58 GMT is something that I would have probably immediately bought um if it had the you know styling of the black bay gmt with the Pepsi bezel and you know or even even if they had done the white dial version of that, you know, but the guilt and everything like that, I think turned a good number of people off of that watch. And sometimes that feels like what they're trying to do. Um, you know, making sure that people think long and hard about what they want, whether it's you know, do you actually want the Rolex or are we gonna give you a budget of something that budget pick of something that's gonna compete with that? Um, I think you know, I heard the feedback from the FXD GMT. I don't really again, I don't necessarily see that as Fotina. I see that as a design choice. Um, but I also see a world in which like if that was just a a a black watch with a lot less color and stuff, it would have been a mass of a much more massive hit with people. So if I was, you know, in charge of tutor, which would probably make me I I I don't understand their corporate structure, but it would probably make me in charge of rollets as well. So I guess it's a cop out. But I would I would I don't want to use the word confidence because I think they're doing a lot of really bold things and confidence makes it sound like they're not, but like have the confidence to say like, look, we're not going to be competing necessarily for the same market share. And so if I'm doing a budget version and I'm giving people exactly what we want, we are doing the best thing for our customers who probably aren't going to be buying a Rolex every day anyway. I think the overlap is not as big as they are afraid it will be. Um |
| James Stacey | Okay. So that that would be my pit |
| Mark Kauzlarich | for Tudor. All right. Rich |
| James Stacey | , you feel any differently? A a different strategy in your mind |
| Rich Fordon | ? I actually feel quite similarly. Um Tudor does annoy me with their use of color and Fotina and on products that if used in a much more toned down color palette would be better products almost like unanimously. And I think that gets into the Rolex, not wanting to compete with Rolex thing and wanting to give people an option that's lower price point and has a bit more color is more of a unique sort of motif, I guess it would be. But uh I this Mark's thoughts actually brought me back to a vintage story that I've heard. Um when when Rolex switched from hollow folded N-link oysters to solid N-link oysters, they updated the Tutor submariner as well, which at that time was the same watch, just with a ETA movement and it was all black. You know, there was much more similarities between Tutor and Rolex at that point, than there are now. But they updated the Tudor Oyster to be Solid Link as well. And they saw a decrease in Rolex and Mariner sales. I mean, this is of course just a story. I don't know the actual numbers, but you do see as you move further into the 90s, they actually revert Tutor back to a folded link oyster to make it feel cheap |
| James Stacey | er and to sort of drive |
| Rich Fordon | more people towards the submariner from Rolex. Um, which I think gets into a lot of the psychology of what tutor and Rolex mean to that larger brand or foundation. However, definitely set up now. |
| James Stacey | Yeah, definitely at the time. I think I think that philosophy, I think that the connection between the two brands is quite different than it was twenty years ago. Um, follow following the relaunch in the US |
| Rich Fordon | . To sort of tie up that point, I think Tudor and Rolex are more split now than they were ever in terms of where they're thought of in the market. I think when somebody's new and into watches, they might say, Oh yeah, Tutor is the sister brand of Rolex, and that's why people sort of start to get interested. But I think their customer bases are so different now that Tutor could do more to release products in more Rolexy colors, like the Black Bay monochrome, and not be so afraid of stealing market share from Rolex, which is just not happening. Like if you look at the colors Rolex uses, which are very, very toned down, very mo mass market. The Pepsi and the Batman and the Sprite. I mean the Sprite feels crazy even it's just green, you know? Like um I think Tudor could use some of those more mass market colors and be more successful while also not stealing any you know market share from Rolex |
| James Stacey | . Yeah. Yeah, I would agree. I would agree if I was put in charge, I would say let's just try and do a couple more really conventional watches. Uh you know, I I think they have such a strong lineup of options. And then even though that's strong and it's you know they they they garner a huge amount of attention in the industry and the rest of it, then they launched something like the what we all call the monochrome, the four the twenty twenty-four forty-one millimeter uh black bay, and you just go like, yeah, but this is this is the one. Like it took them however many years, uh twelve years or whatever, uh to, kind of dig into that. And and I think they they just made a great thing and I would love them to take that formula and apply it to the GMT and apply it to the the 58 in general and the 54 and all this sort of stuff and just kind of keep iterating in that space. And you know, hope hopefully we we can we continue to see some cool kind of avant-garde thinking in the FXD space. I think it's like the FXD being a sub brand of the Palagos gives them some room to play around, whether it's a you know, cycling chronograph or uh or something as wild as as like the uh the proper FXD um GMT and that sort of thing. So I think there's lots of good uh on the horizon for them, and I'm excited to see it. And I mean, obviously we can parlay this right into Rolex. We've got a handful of brands. So I'm going to say you got two or three sentences. What would you do with uh Rolex this year |
| Rich Fordon | ? Mark, Daytona, singletone, subdials. No. Oh yeah |
| Mark Kauzlarich | . No, I mean that's that's for me that that would be it. I mean uh look, they only did one steel sports watch last year, uh at Watches and Wonders, which I think really people didn't process. Um yeah. Steel Daytona, like the Lamon with the the singletone subdials, um is basically I think everything that anybody's been asking for. I don't care about the lollipop indices on the subdials or any of that. I don't need the red on the bezel. Just give a classic looking Daytona back to the market. And um I mean Rolits is printing money already, so I guess I could say they'll be printing even more money. But um that would be it for me. So thanks, Rich |
| Rich Fordon | . Yeah. I think there's a few small tweaks that Rolex could make to already existing products like the Submariner. I I just think of it because Jeff Illiard is always complaining about the clasp on his new Submariner in the office. Rolex like still leans into wanting to create a professional product for this imagined consumer that's diving deep with their watches um or doing the exact thing that you're supposed to be doing with their professional models, um, which is the reason why that clasp is so big and long because of dive extensions and wanting to, you know, feel like a very stout product for that honestly imaginary consumer. I I there I'm sure people are diving. There's there's a hand |
| James Stacey | ful for sure, but it it's it's not not to the extent that the submariner is made. That's two two very different numbers |
| Rich Fordon | . I don't think you lose much of that consumer or that wearer and like big part of your brand identity by making the small tweaks to make a watch like the Summariner a bit more comfortable for everyday life. And I think that sort of thinking can be trickled down throughout their whole catalog for those professional models. Like, hey guys, we don't have to be so, so professional anymore. You're making a watch that's I think mass market for the most part and uh debatably luxury according to some of our team members, but um yeah, I think that is long gone for Rolex, you know, and they're not making a watch for Scuba divers anymore and uh they could do a few small things. |
| James Stacey | I would also say like within the world of Rolex's lineup, they also have the pro the the pro pro diver in the sea dweller, so I think they would have room to actually make the sub a little bit more cushy, if you will. Uh I I would love I would love to see what the next eventual evolution of the Explorer 2 is. Uh you know, we haven't seen a new you like a fully new take on that model in quite some time But I think I think it's an exciting time. You know, with you guys on the call, I would love also like uh again try and keep it keep it tight so we can get to a handful of these but what about patek is there something you would just maybe maybe we go this route doesn't have to be the CEO thing what's just something you would love to see from Patek you know, in a recent um in a recent video that Ben did for the UBS thing, he spoke about wanting a really genuinely high-end take on a time only tech, something with the finishing from the higher level models in a in a very tech forward movement and that sort of thing. Is that would you guys just pair it like is that something that's kind of universally felt among Patek's fan base |
| Mark Kauzlarich | ? I would just say simplify for Patek. Like that's all they really need to do is um they have for for a brand that makes so few watches in a year, they they have a lot of models. They could simplify, you know, also simplifies maybe some of where they're drawing inspiration from in their history. And you know, look, if I could, if I could have anything, if I could do like a slightly smaller QP uh chronograph um with like a V shape clut uh case, you know, that's not a very it's a complex movement, but it's not a very complex demand. Um forget like triple step cases or whatever, but just like simplify and give sort of a little bit more of a classic taste and |
| James Stacey | sure. A little bit less, you |
| Mark Kauzlarich | know. What do you think, Rich? |
| Rich Fordon | Yeah, I think Ben's call out is basically he wants PatTec to make a retch up or something on that level. Um I would want a similar Loking and feeling product, but at the other end of the pricing spectrum, I'd love to see Patek come out with a viable um less than 38, 39 millimeter Calatrava that you could enter the brand with. They just don't have that product right now. They don't have the entry level this is what Patek is time only watch. Uh which I think is desperately needed |
| James Stacey | . Okay, cool. I I agree with those for sure. What about uh what about Cartier? I know certainly Rich, uh, you just did a great story for the magazine, volume thirteen, uh, reference points on the tank LC. Well, what would you love to see from uh you know we had a party at Cartier last year, we were all in the room, it was a very busy day, and they had a lot of watches. What would you guys love to see, you know, come March, April from Cartier |
| Rich Fordon | ? Carter Bay does a lot of what I would already want to see, to be honest. I think of modern brands, they respect their heritage maybe the best. Um That being said, they respect their heritage the best at the high price point C P C P stuff. I would like to see that level of thinking and that level of care and um honestly sizing and like case thickness, the effort that they put towards that CPCP level product is for the consumer like me, who is really knowledgeable about their history and understands how those vintage and even like even from the 90s cases feel and how they wear on your wrist. Um I'd like to see that trickle down to uh the more commercial product like a centre that you don't have to spend 80 grand to buy would be amazing. |
| James Stacey | Mark, what do you figure for Cartier? That |
| Mark Kauzlarich | 's about what I would say. I think again, like they they do a lot of really respectful things with their hair I every year they come out with something really interesting. I think it was the Cousin that was like the watch that you could press and it would move and you know it was |
| James Stacey | That was a kind of a scary thing to witness in person, this like cushion watch that you could you could compress the case like a |
| Mark Kauzlarich | pillow and you can push on it, but it's set with diamonds and stuff. |
| James Stacey | Like the most expensive Tide Pod I've ever held. |
| Mark Kauzlarich | You know, then they do they do their you know rewind this year, which I think a lot of people thought that they were crazy for um on now it's like in a lot of people's picks for you know, I think GQ mentioned it as one of the best watches of the year. I think a lot of people have come around to it as a crazy idea. Um, I think that kind of thing, but maybe make it slightly less limited, slightly more accessible. Um, I also like this is a really random thing, and maybe they're doing it for like high-end clients, and I don't know, but bring bring back the like super wild 1920s cardia mystery clocks. I don't know who wants them. Okay. I don't know like who wants to spend a million dollars on a jade mystery clock? But I wanna see that like sitting in the center of the watches and wonders display and just be like, Okay, cool, they just brought back this thing that people are going crazy for on the auction market and they're I think they're very aware of what the market is is doing. So it would be kind of fun to see |
| James Stacey | . Absolutely. Oh, I got I got one more for |
| Rich Fordon | Cartier. Um sapphire or blue cabochons on white metal cases. I just do not like the Rbyu or red cabochons on platinum watches |
| James Stacey | . All right. Interesting. Well, there you go. So a few tips for uh for Cartier there. Look, the next one is one of that I think is it's a whole different ballgame than than what we've been talking about, but what about with Swatch? Arguably the kind of the impression brand on the internet of last couple years, thanks to Moon Swatch, and then uh in some ways also Scuba 50 downstream of that. What uh what would you guys love to see from Swatch? I talked about this with Maleka and Tantan and they had some ideas for watches they would love to see be swatchified, like in the same metric as the Moon Swatch and the Scuba 50. If we're even dreaming outside of the realm of the Swatch group, what brand do you think would would offer a really fun platform for that sort of exploration and that sort of um move to bring a brain that we would know as watch nerds down to a level where a lot like a lot more people might be interested in experiencing it and lining up for the product and all that kind of stuff |
| Rich Fordon | . Yeah, I I don't know about like doing a moonswatch rel |
| Mark Kauzlarich | ated collab or something like that, but um one I I know that they've put some online. I'd like to see them start putting more of these releases online for people. Um I think, you know, now that they've slowed down past the moonshine releases |
| Rich Fordon | being so frequent, I think the pace |
| Mark Kauzlarich | is pretty good. Um so yeah, I mean I I don't I don't know. What uh what I'd like to see is more op |
| Rich Fordon | tions just in their general lineup. I know they |
| Mark Kauzlarich | have a a ton of a ton of watches out there. Um, but I went into a swatch store with my mom actually a couple weeks ago and was looking for something that might fit her and it just like there weren't enough smaller options. There weren't enough things that really did anything for her. I was gonna buy her one just as a fun gift and and um you know, so a couple more options, a couple more fun things, a couple more simple things, just continue expanding the lineup now that you've got the eyeballs on the brand. And again, like look you the they know what they're doing with the moonswatch thing. You've James, you've said it. Like people ask us to stop covering it. We'll stop covering it when they stop reading it. You know |
| James Stacey | , um, the amount of cli |
| Mark Kauzlarich | cks and it's not all about the clicks, but uh that does show that there is a level of interest when that stuff com |
| Mark Kauzlarich | es out. So who am I to say |
| Mark Kauzlarich | that we shouldn't cover that? Rich |
| James Stacey | , what do you figure? Yeah, on the col |
| Rich Fordon | laboration question, I'm still trying to think, but um, I don't know why this one popped ahead, popped to mind. But um, they've done a chronograph, they've done a dive watch. I'd like to see something a bit more interesting on the dress side. Um, like a dressy swatch collaboration, I think would be cool. I don't think it would be nearly as popular as something like a moon swatch, and um, but like I don't know why this one obviously it's in the group, but I actually really like Harry Winston's aesthetic, the case that mimics the front doors of uh their I think it's their flagship boutique. I'm not sure. I know don't even know what that they they call the name or this case these days, but it's very like architectural. And um I think they might sell four and three to me, but doing a moon or a swatch collab with Harry Winston in that case, I think would be really cool actually. A Harry's watch? Yeah, yeah. It's got a ring to it |
| Mark Kauzlarich | . Yeah. And it's a totally different product than what we're thinking of, probably. But uh yeah. |
| James Stacey | I uh yeah, I I think it's a fascinating thing to kind of dream about other brands that this could that I think it could work on. I think the craziest one in my mind would be Rechard Mill, like a swatch reshard mill. Uh something that captured the case shape and the architecture but rendered it not in, you know, nanotubes and TPTs, but rather in uh in bio ceramic, you know, obviously the the issue there's some issue there with to really replicate a recharge mill you usually have some insane complication or technical s ofort evolution or or even just like skeletonization. So some of that could be kind of difficult. But I do kind of like dream of that. I think I think Hublow would be an interesting partner for for them as well, like to do a a little big bang or or even something more wild, something in like in a little bit more of a conceptual space could be really fun. Uh yeah, I I I don't think the idea is going away. I think this would be a crazy time for them to like go, ah, we did enough. It's all good. I think we'll see more speedies. I don't know if we'll see more Blanc Pond. I'd but I'd be surprised if we didn't see more speedies down the road from them. And I agree with Mark. The thing that I would be changing if I was in charge would be I get like if you just launched the brand new one and it's for a specific color of the moon, sure, yeah, it's it's store only for the first month. Or it's store only and they sell them out and you don't have to put them online. But with anything that's not limited, like just sell it online. Let people buy 'em |
| Mark Kauzlarich | . I I had one last idea with this watch thing, and I thought about it because I have this watch um from a retailer in Japan and I think it's something that they could maybe do, but um, you know, you said they've done other complications. What about a like push button minute repeater swatch? You know, get somebody to make I I have a quartz minute repeater. |
| James Stacey | So cool. And it's the brain |
| Mark Kauzlarich | literally just it's Shellman. Uh retailer. Yeah, Shellman in Japan. We'll put it in the show notes. |
| James Stacey | You guys have to see this thing. It it I jaw d jaw dropped for not that much money when when you showed it to me. |
| Mark Kauzlarich | Yeah, I mean they're they're harder and harder to find because they were made in the I think in the nineties, late nineties maybe, but um but you know, it it's a Miyota movement, it's quartz movement and it ha it's a digital |
| Rich Fordon | chime. So it has |
| Mark Kauzlarich | that digital like almost eight-bit quality, but it kind |
| James Stacey | of repeated on your Chevy Lumina |
| Mark Kauzlarich | . So so why why not do do that if you're swatch? Like I'm sure it would maybe be a $500 watch, but I'm sure they could figure out a way to make a you know a beeping sound out of a a watch and then all of a sudden they've got some sort of a minute repeater. |
| James Stacey | I mean that's a really fascinating idea because it takes it kind of takes the moon swatch idea and flips it on its head where they're taking an iconic design and like a cultural element and making it a swatch. And with this, imagine if it was a Blanc Pon or a brigade or something like that where you could really tap into the structure of some very traditional watchmaking and introduce that as the platform for new enthusiasts. I think that could be that's actually uh that's cool. I like that idea. Uh look, we are running the clock though, so I I just wanted to leave it up for the last five minutes or whatever we've got. Anything else you guys are like looking forward to next year, something you're excited about? I'm kind of like I'm stressed about it to be fair, but I'm also kind of excited to see what Watch and Wonders is gonna be like after last year. I think it's going to be I'm expecting some fireworks, would be my guess |
| Rich Fordon | . Yeah, I mean I think we were sort |
| Mark Kauzlarich | of told going into Watches and Wonders last year that this year was going to be kind of |
| Rich Fordon | tame um with |
| Mark Kauzlarich | build year or whatever. Yeah, and it was, you |
| Rich Fordon | know, people people holding back 2025, |
| Mark Kauzlarich | nice strong number, or you get something interesting coming out. I think that's fine. Um until the you know, it's like you put off a deadline and all of a sudden you know you have you have fourteen assignments that are due at the same time. Like it's kind of exc |
| Rich Fordon | iting to see and and you hope that it |
| Mark Kauzlarich | 's it's gonna happen, but now I'm a little stressed about, you know, if you've got 12 brands that are gonna have the biggest year, you've got an anniversary for Vashron, 270th, you've got an anniversary for AP. So there I think there's gonna be a lot going on. The other thing is is when you say stuff like that, it it does push the expectations up a little bit. For sure. You know, and so it's it's very possible that like it could be you could walk into Watches of Wonders and have the uh the like Christmas Day uh sort of situation where you open the package and you're like, oh |
| Rich Fordon | , socks. You know, |
| Mark Kauzlarich | like uh you know, you got really excited, you told people what you wanted and that's what you got, which I've started to reach the point in my life where socks aren't a terrible gift, but so |
| James Stacey | cks are a great gift. But but if you' |
| Mark Kauzlarich | re expecting a yak back, the socks are |
| James Stacey | tough, you know? Yeah. Yeah. The only one on this call old enough for the yak back. Understood. Okay, fine. So Rich, how about you? Any any final mo final thoughts for twenty twenty-five |
| Rich Fordon | ? Um I'm just thinking about my sort of what I called twenty twenty four, which was the year of the shaped watch. I think um 2025 might be the year of we're tired of the Sape Shaped W |
| Mark Kauzlarich | atch. Um I |
| Rich Fordon | 'm just I'm just thinking of uh the actual buyer and someone who's interested in something like that is pretty thin. And I I sort of hesitate with especially the larger brands. Um if they're shaped watches on the floor at Watches and Wonders, I think we're in we're in trouble. |
| James Stacey | What sort of trouble? I think people will |
| Rich Fordon | just get tired of that trend and and revert back to round and like more standard designs pretty quickly. Um I don't I'm not calling it because I think there's something else going on with the crash market. But if you look at the way the crash has sort of trended downwards, it's telling me that um the buyer for things like that at the highest level is not a very wide market. So um I think if if micro brands continue to go into that space and and look into different shapes, although I'm all for it, I'll I'll love 'em every time. Um, I think sort of the mass watch world might sort of flinch if uh if brands and smaller brands continue to enter into this shaped, uh like interesting design-led uh market set |
| James Stacey | . Nice. Yeah, good feedback and a good thought. I had the shaped, shaped trend on on the list and we didn't get to it. That's how these pods go. I'm sure we'll have lots of uh fresh conversations in the new year, but I wanted to thank both you guys for coming on and closing out 2024 with me |
| Rich Fordon | . Hopping champagne now is this how it's gone. L |
| James Stacey | et's do it. Yeah. I I don't this'll probably run like right around New Year's, uh one of uh somebody will be getting some champagne for sure. |
| Mark Kauzlarich | I should have had like sparklers or something ready for the |
| Rich Fordon | Yeah, you guys didn't bring caviar and champagne or we |
| James Stacey | 'll just have we'll put all that in digitally. It'll be okay. We'll use the AI. It'll be fine. But yeah, thank you so much for listening and to you guys for coming on the show. And if you're listening and want to get in on the conversation about what you think 2025 is going to be like, what your favorite parts of 2024 were, major watches, releases you're hoping to see next year, the rest of it, hit the show notes and you'll find the comments just below that on hoodinky.com and certainly a great conversation over on YouTube as well. So thanks so much for listening this year and we'll be back in early twenty twenty five with more. Take care of the |