This is Open Work, a look inside the watch industry, a podcast from Collective Horology. I'm Asher Apkin, co-founder of Collective. And I'm Gabe Reilly, co-founder of Collective. Collective Horology is an independent watch retailer based in Southern California. We carry a wide range of independent brands, including Singer Reimagined, Arcanaut, Fears, and more. To learn more about us and check out our available inventory, visit collectivehorology.com.
Speaking of collectivehorology.com, Asher, we have some new stuff.
Stuff so a couple couple things we got some new stuff and i'm not just talking about watches we did recently add both singer reimagined who have some absolutely wild chronographs to the site we also added garrick who make incredibly beautiful bespoke watches in england to the site but not only do we have new watches but we have a bunch of new content all of which is available through collective horology.com so if you like the podcast maybe you'll like
some of this other stuff so So we have been going absolutely ham on YouTube, doing a bunch of really in-depth video reviews with watches we carry. I think this is important because a lot of the stuff we carry is very unusual. And there's just actually not been a lot on YouTube about these watches. We know YouTube is a really important place that people go to learn about and research watches.
So we wanted to make sure the stuff that we carry is represented there and we have the opportunity to show video. Additionally, we've also done and created a lot of written articles and written reviews as well of watches that we carry. And importantly, whether it's in the YouTube videos or in those written articles, one thing we made sure we cover in all of those reviews and articles is case dimensions. Diameter, lug to lug, and height. We know that that's something people always
want to know. So we made sure we included that there. So if you're curious about anything we carry, the chances are there's probably now an in-depth video and article available through our site on that stuff. Also important and coming up, we have our next collaboration coming up soon.
So in just a couple weeks here, by the time this podcast launches, it'll be about actually a week after this podcast launches no two weeks after this podcast launches we have our upcoming collaboration with arm and strom which in many ways is kind of us revisiting our initial collaboration with arm and strom with a couple of important changes so if you are keen on that collaboration if you're curious about arm and strom just want to learn about them the best way to find out about
that collaboration and get early access before the watch launches publicly is to join our list and And you can do that at collectivehorology.com. Just click join our list and our list always gets first access before things launch publicly. But enough of my yakking here. What do you say? Let's boogie. So today on the podcast, we're going to share our biggest lessons from going inside the watch industry. So both Asher and I made the transition from watch enthusiasts to industry insiders.
And we've had the opportunity to retail watches, design them, meet many industry luminaries, and even serve as GPHG Academy members. And we've learned a ton along the way. So we often get asked what that journey has been like, and in particular, what advice we'd give to others who are looking to do the same or are just kind of curious about how the industry works. So today we are going to share our most significant lessons. Asher, have you learned anything in the last few years? Yes.
Yeah, of course. I'm going to, this is a topic before we even get into it. I think I just, it's good to set some context. This is a conversation that Gabe and I have amongst ourselves all the time.
Whether it's checking ourselves in terms of, shall we say, a little bit of karmic retribution when we find ourselves in a position that we have put others in as collectors, all the way through to some real eye-opening empathy that, you know, for a lot of the people who work in this business in all manner of roles from component manufacturing to wholesale to retail to fixture design, et cetera. And that has given way, I think, to a great deal of not only insight, but also humility on our part.
So we're going to dive into that with you guys. And there are some things that we'll talk about here that are a little embarrassing, but I also think are really important because when your passion becomes your livelihood, so many things change.
Change the passion doesn't the love of watches the love of the art form doesn't but everything around it does so we thought we would we would jump into that and start there so gabe what have you learned what have i learned i think the the biggest thing i learned making the transition from.
Being an enthusiast and having this be a hobby to now having this be my livelihood is and this is going to sound really stupid and really obvious but but it is meaningful and it's been profound which is that this is a business and just like any other line of of business there are realities and challenges that that come along with it and in in this in this kind of macro lesson right i have a few other points but i think in the notion of like what okay so what do i mean like Like,
obviously, I knew this was a business. You and I started this to be a business. We went from this notion of having this be something we were just purely passionate about and was purely fun to having this be something that is still fun and something we're still, if not more passionate about, to having this be a business reality. This is our jobs. This is how we provide for our family.
And this is how we spend now literally all of our time pretty much outside of our families, because not only is this our job, but it remains our passion as well. So we're just as into watches as we were before. But I think there's a few things that I learned as far as this being a business. Number one, every job has its challenges. There are hard days, there are difficult people, there are logistics and realities. Like we, just like every other business, have to do our bookkeeping.
You know, that's not something I ever thought I would be doing, but I've learned how to do bookkeeping among many, many, many other kind of skills, small and large. There are politics. There is, speaking of accounting, the reality of making cash flow work on every month. You know, we have bills that come in no matter whether it was a great sales month or a terrible sales month. You know, we still have We still have payroll. We still have rent to pay. We have vendors to pay.
And so there are just some hard realities of it being a business that I don't think occurred to me. And I think what the aha for me or the insight wasn't so much, oh, yeah, it's a business.
Well, of course it is. it's it's now changed the way i think about the people who i came in contact with when i was an enthusiast who were in the business i really just thought and this is okay by the way there's i'm not, dissing myself or anyone else but i really thought about those folks whether they were dealers or brand owners or anyone else as sort of an extension of my hobby and i didn't necessarily.
Really consider the business realities for them so much and, And that doesn't mean, you know, you have to be the world's best customer or buy watches from everyone or anything like that. I just think I could have had a little bit more empathy for the fact that this was their career, their livelihoods, and the way they put food on the table. And I'll give one good example, not of something I did that was stupid, but maybe something I did well outside of purchasing watches to support a business.
So one dealer who we both know and love is topper jewelers in burlingame california you and i used to live in in the bay area we're down in southern california now and i must have spent hours at topper jewelers before i ever over the course of years before i ever purchased a watch from them i didn't buy anything for years i went to the store i would go to events i would ask questions of of the owners and the sales associates.
And it didn't really occur to me that maybe, I don't know if it was, they never certainly let on, but it never occurred to me that that might be frustrating for them. But one thing that I did that I think was positive, even though I didn't buy anything, eventually I did buy plenty from Topper.
So their patience paid off. But one small thing I did that I think did actually demonstrate some empathy for the fact that my hobby was their business this was write a Yelp review before I ever bought a watch from them. So this is a long way of saying, look, if you're listening to this and watches are purely a hobby, that's great. You don't need to buy things you don't want. You don't need to buy stuff from us or anyone else. There's no obligation to do that.
But there are certainly things you could do outside of buying watches to show some empathy for the fact that the person you may be talking to, dealing with, asking questions of Is doing this as an enterprise to support themselves and their family and their career and all that stuff. Yeah. I'm listening to you say all that, and Lord knows I have personally done the same.
And as I think about it, one of the things that I've learned that's really, I think, uniquely challenging about the space that we occupy in hotrology and in luxury is the rather monumental amount of liquidity that is required to not just sustain a business, but to simply make it a profitable endeavor.
Ever and it's an interesting thing you know we talked a lot over the last 10 episodes about watch pricing and things of that nature and, If you want to learn more about that and have a chance to listen to that, go back and check out the episode on how watches are priced. But the reason I bring that up is it really is a hell of a service that a lot of independent watch dealers provide. Because they're taking, and I don't think I realized this, because how could I?
Because frankly, I don't even know that you should, because so much of luxury is about not seeing the work behind the curtain, but seeing the magic in front of it.
So as a lesson I took away, I really saw that and believed that, and then didn't quite see in my mind what was necessary and the incredible gift a lot of these independent retailers do and bring to their communities by essentially purchasing, not essentially, literally purchasing all of these watches to have for clients to hold, to see, to experience, and ideally, ultimately to buy. Because of course, every watch that we purchase that's in our safe or out in a display or what have you, we own.
And we own it until somebody else does. And that is some, so being able to come to see something in our offices in Ventura or in LA or what have you, that is an expression of our belief in those brands and our willingness to put our literal money where our mouth is around them. So I think that was something that hadn't really occurred to me because, and I think this probably exposes my own ignorance about starting a business.
And I'll preface by using one of my favorite metaphors, which is like starting a small business is not unlike starting a family, Which is that it is impossible to explain, I think, to somebody who has never owned a business what it is to own a business in the exact same way that it's virtually impossible to explain to somebody what it is to have children if you don't have them.
Because it's just it's a unique and distinct experience that is that is uniquely wonderful and uniquely challenging, you know, in different ways.
And as a result, you know, when we would do things like projections on a business where we'd sit down and I gave, I don't know if I ever told you this, but I found the original spreadsheet that I had when we decided we wanted to start doing retail, where I just written out, I'm like, oh, well, if we buy this many watches from these, you know, incredible brands who will totally just 100% work with us the first time we ask them, then this is the revenue we can project.
And I looked at it and I was like, my God, this might as well have been written by, you know, by me in a crayon. Like, I mean, this is toddler level thinking.
And but the thing is, it exposed, I think, my own innocence and my own lack of knowledge in understanding how margins are metabolized, how cash flow operates, how insurance is required, what a space means, you know, and even little things that like all of us who have worked corporately, myself included, take for granted, like internal tools and systems.
You know, like these are these are things that we all take for granted when we sit down at a job, you know, but we need a collective the exact same level of internal tools for inventory tracking, video conferencing, note taking, understanding and remembering every single thing that a client wants so we can make sure to get them what they want when they want it or if they put in a request for it, etc. And those all require meaningful tools, which require site licenses,
which require integrations, which require us to learn how to use them. It's a real business beyond the experience that's made for the client. And that was something that I didn't have visibility in. So when I look back at that spreadsheet and I look at the projected revenue, I'm like, oh, Asher. Yeah but you kind of need a little bit of that naivete 100 otherwise you know otherwise why why wouldn't you yeah it's funny a lot of those things you're describing.
You know when i worked in other jobs they were just part of the air i breathed like of course there's word processing software of course there's a fedex account whatever it might be now those are very real line items in quickbooks that deserve scrutiny because we have to ask ourselves, is it better for me to put money into a tool or a service? And some of these, by the way, cost thousands of dollars a month. Or am I better off buying inventory or redeploying that capital somewhere else?
I'm with you. I don't think I fully appreciate it. Again, this is just pure naivete how capital intensive this business really is. And it's funny, when I I go into like a multi-brand watch dealer, forget independent watches, but any big multi-brand retailer. So say like Feldmar here in Los Angeles, you know, I used to go in there just purely as a kid in a candy store. I mean, the selection in a store like that is immense and...
Just amazing. Now I go in there, it's no less interesting to me to see all the watches, but I almost just sort of see dollar signs everywhere. Cause I'm thinking like, you know, what is that case from brand Y plus that case from brand X plus that case from brand Z on and on cost? Because of course they're, they're carrying that inventory and they're buying it outright for, for the, you know, my privilege to be able to go in there as, as a curious person and just see it all.
And I don't think I really understood that. Of course, as collectors and hobbyists, any watch was a very considered purchase, whether it was a $400 watch, a $4,000 watch, or whatever else it may be. It was an extremely personal and considered purchase because that's serious money, no matter really how wealthy you are. Now, as an owner of a retailer, it's that on a whole nother scale.
And I just don't think I really understood the financial risk i think it's easy to think about we talked a lot about margin for instance in our episode with with mike margolis on pricing pricing i think it's very easy to think about like okay well an authorized dealer of a watch brand or even a secondary market dealer makes a margin and so for every watch they're selling they're making money and that's true they do make money on the watches they sell ideally
ideally but keep in mind like what about all the other watches that are sitting in the store, some of which aren't selling. So the cost of carrying that inventory relative to what else you might be able to do with that money, in many ways, is daunting and overwhelming. That brings me to the second thing. Before you go there, though, because it's an interesting point there.
And this is a lesson that I'm only just realizing we've internalized as you talk, which is one of the most interesting and scary, but also exciting parts about being a retailer dedicated exclusively to independence is that we, 99% of the time, are following our gut on what we think good art is. And sometimes that bet is financially very successful and sometimes it's less so.
But the thing is, if we only ever made our choices based off of what would be financially successful, then we wouldn't really be doing a service as an independent retailer because we wouldn't ever bring novelty out because that would require us to be so risk averse that we would never do it. And so, yeah, you're right. Like sometime I'll flip around what you just said. You're right. Let's say watch A sells, but watch B, C and D are still sitting there.
And yes that has a challenge on cash flow and capital and etc the flip side of that is and another way to look at it is because watch a sold that enabled us to have watch bc and d there and even though those may take longer to sell because they're more esoteric or more unusual or you know slightly smaller in a big watch phase or big watch in a small watch phase or whatever, it still enables that level of novelty to be present and be discovered and ultimately
when I think about like why we do this at all, it's for that reason. So that for every super popular watch that we sell, there's a little bit of goofy esoterica in the corner that is going to speak to someone and it enables that.
So that's the other way to look at it too. It's like when people, when people get up in arms about mass production watches, for example, I like to think and Feldmar is a good example of this, by the way, Feldmar, I would have to imagine makes a lot lot of revenue off of Omega, for example, but.
The money that they make off of something like Omega or Tudor or one of the other larger brands that they carry probably enables them to put their money in stuff that they really believe in, like Resonance or Trilobe or Ulysses Nardin or any number of the other brands that they've been incredible champions of.
So I think when you look at that and you look at a dealer and there's a box that's full of really interesting watches, you can look at that as a liability or you can look at that as a benefit. But it's definitely interesting when you can, you know, a lot of those folks who are buying Speedmasters to a certain degree are allowing stores like that and owners like that to take a little bit more risk because they have consistent cash flow on it. Yeah.
And when we sell a watch, we don't realize, quote unquote, the full profit on those watches, both for the reason you just described, but also because this is a growing business. You know, we started Collective in 2019. So as an authorized retailer, and we didn't really begin the work of being an authorized dealer until just a few years ago. So this is a growing business. And outside of paying ourselves a living wage. Really every dollar we make gets reinvested back into this business.
It helps us bring in a new brand that we believe in. So for instance, bringing in Singer Reimagined, that wouldn't be something that is possible at all if we weren't successful selling other watches and then had been able to take those proceeds and invest them in bringing in a new brand who we really believe in. But this is a great segue.
Your point is really the best segue to kind of the second big lesson that you and I have had to learn, which is I've had to learn to separate my own taste and what I think is interesting or what I think is commercial from the market reality, which is it's one thing as a collector to buy things that you love and believe in. And by the way, if you're a collector or an enthusiast, just buy what you love.
That's my biggest advice. But as a retailer buying, I think you and I have learned some lessons around we can't only just buy what we believe in or what we think will be successful. I'm going to caveat that. We have to be, go ahead. We have to buy what we believe in at the brand level. Of course. Right. So I'll give you a really interesting example. In Speak Marin, that is a brand who we really believe in. We think the watches and the level of watchmaking there is exceptional.
The watches that are your favorite and my favorite in those collections, we found aren't necessarily what most people are interested in. So, for instance, when I think about Speaks time-only watches, so they really have two kind of core collections for sort of time-only watches. There's the academic collection and there's the ripples. Now, the ripples is their answer to a stainless steel integrated bracelet sports watch. the academic is sort of their kind of time-only watch. I love the academic.
There's something about it that just speaks to me, pun intended, I guess. It's my sentimental favorite among their time-only watches. Most people, however, are really interested in the ripples. And when we initially placed our order, we heavied up on academics because that's what you and I really like.
And all of a sudden, most of the phone calls we were getting for those time-only watches were about the ripples, which people found to be a really interesting and different take on the stainless steel sports watch category. So that was a lesson for me. I can't just buy what I like in terms of references within a brand. I really need to be a bit more open-minded about what other people might like.
And that would have been, in that case, probably spreading our bets more evenly and ordering more of a mix of things versus just what you and I thought was the most least interesting and we personally wanted to carry. Yeah. As you say that, that's another interesting thing that I've learned too, which is how to interpret the feedback that we get from our clients. Because there's different layers of feedback, you know, like there's the, oh, that's an interesting brand.
There's, you know, oh, this is, I love this watch, not buying that, but that watch is awesome. And then the watch that I buy, or someone buys, you know, and that's on a gradient scale. And like, that is such valuable information.
I find it really interesting when we announce a new brand or we release a new reference from someone that we carry, the kind of feedback that we do get back from, you know, on Instagram or from our clients, you know, because it's all very, you know, it's all pretty raw and pretty honest in both directions. And sometimes we get people who are like, oh my God, I love these guys. Like, heck yeah, psych that you have them.
You know, and sometimes we get like, well, you guys have been on the internet, you know, so sometimes that happens. And then sometimes we also get someone who says, I'm ready. Whoa, you guys stock that? Let's do it. And that helps us understand how to stock things too, you know? Because when something sells, it gives us more insight into what the audience and what clients really love and what they want. And that also helps us, by the way, provide feedback back to the brands.
Because believe it or not, independent brands do ask us like, well, what are your clients saying? And, you know, is there something that they really like? Is there something that they don't? Like, is there something preventing them from investing in us or something that encouraged them to do it?
And I think early on, I was a little shy about sharing some of that feedback back to brands because I felt that if it wasn't representative of what I thought was cool, like the example that you made there, that maybe I was shortchanging the brand or I was being cynical or something. And the truth is, like, I'm not. Because all of these folks want to make really interesting watches that meet, that are commercially viable.
And if you can do both, then you've really nailed it and you're cooking with gas. But to do that, you need to listen to what the audience has to say. And some of that might be, I don't like date windows that are in certain locations. And that's kind of like, okay, fair enough. Maybe that advice is taken, maybe it isn't if it's not intrinsic to the design language of the brand.
And sometimes it's a really interesting point. The ergonomics of this case are amazing, but I just can't wear it because my wrist is too big or too small or what have you. And like, but for the actual ergonomics, I would be an advocate of this brand and learning that and being able to listen to that and having, you know, the, I think the humility to be able to go to a brand and say, I love what you're doing, but this doesn't work.
Not because I don't think that what you're doing conceptually is rad, but because the specific product isn't meeting a market demand and there's an opportunity there. And having that open dialogue is something that I have become more comfortable with over time in a way that I don't feel I was comfortable with when we started doing this, largely because I didn't feel like I had the right to make that kind of feedback, to bring that kind of feedback to a brand.
Are you open to me playing the role of the practical and the cynic here? Pragmatist. Oh, sorry. The pragmatist and the cynic? Now you may. Okay, now I may. I've got permission. So playing the role of the pragmatist and the cynic, I want to put a finer point on something you just said and also just challenge the last part of what you said a little bit. So I think I've learned something a little bit. Different or, or, you know, both things can be true at the same time.
One lesson I've learned not to eat yogurt in the office when I'm here, that's a whole, that is, we're not going there, man. And it's been a while since I've done that, but I'm not even the main offender. Okay. What I've learned is to take feedback with a grain of salt. And here's what I mean. So what you were just describing was thoughtful and considered product feedback.
And that absolutely Absolutely has its place. And it's something, by the way, the brands I'm also surprised by, because I sort of view a lot of the brands and the watchmakers as like, well, you're the brand and the watchmaker. You have the vision. This is an expression of you. How could you even care what I might think? But they do, because guess what? It's a business for them as well. And they want to make sure they're meeting a market.
But I've learned to separate a lot of the response to a watch, good or bad, from the commercial reality of it. So you once said to me that there's often a difference between enthusiasm and conversion, meaning there's often a difference between what people say and how they react to a watch, whether that's in a comment on news article or a comment on Instagram or in a WhatsApp group.
There's often the difference between that and how they respond there might be, this is awesome, I love it, this brand is great, wow, to this is terrible, I hate it, it's awful, whatever. There's often a big difference between that and then the commercial reality. One thing we talked with Thomas Fleming about was... He had to navigate mixed feedback on his Series 1 watch, yet it was an incredibly successful, by all accounts, watch commercially.
He sold through the first series of watches in quick order, and I think I mentioned there are people, because he had some tough feedback, reaching out to him and being like, oh my god, I'm so sorry about the launch. But no, in that case, you really can't confuse difficult initial response or the noise of the crowd to the commercial reality. Same thing as we have seen and been a part of ourselves. We've given this feedback on things. Watches that get incredible acclaim, but no one buys them.
That's awesome. I love it, but they're not commercially viable. So I think I've had to learn to separate out the optics of something, what you see on social media, what you read in a blog post, what you hear in a WhatsApp group from whether something is actually commercial or kind of successful from a business standpoint.
Point yeah i i could not agree more and as i think too about some other things that i've learned, one of them and i think this is a byproduct of the of an earlier point that we made about learning what it means to be an entrepreneur and learning what it means to to have a not just a successful business but but fundamentally a sustainable one which i you know i would argue is is probably the first step towards success is getting to a place of stability and sustainability
where you feel confident in your business's ability to, to, you know, be self-sustaining. And there was a comment on an article that Gabe and I read. I'm not going to mention the outlet or the person who wrote it, but I am going to quote from it directly. Oh, I was tempted to quote from it directly, so I'm glad you are. Yeah.
And the reason why I'm going to read this is not because I'm trying to go after this person or demonize them or whatever, but because it really, I think, encapsulates how opaque sometimes the realities of entrepreneurs can be to the folks that are consuming that content.
Content because I'll preface by saying, I think there's legitimate passion and frustration behind the comment about somebody who probably really is enthusiastic about watches and really wants everything to work out the way that they want it to, but it is articulated in a way that I think encapsulates a lot of misunderstanding. So I'm going to quote from it and then we can talk about it.
Quote, what annoys me with micro brands though is limited capacity and unwillingness to invest and expand production to meet demand. I simply cannot comprehend that kind of economical suicidal refusal to accept the basic rules of industrial management and capitalism. Perpetual out-of-stock notifications, waiting lists, artificially created demand. It offends me as a buyer.
With so many options out there, I, at least in 99% of cases, just go somewhere else and give my money to someone who is ready to accept it and deliver promptly. I mean, five or six years waiting for an anordain watch or daily check on the Arkin website, whether they decided to sell some Altair watches as if it cures cancer. Hello, identify bottlenecks in your supply production and sale process and do what you are supposed to do, sell and make a profit, end quote.
So I found this to be a really interesting comment and I'm going to remove like the, like, I don't want to get into like a conversation about like tone or like like online trolling or whatever. I want to look at this for like the actual fact of it. Because I want to be honest with you, if I go back into comments that I made on Hodinkee. Oh, I've done that. Yeah. Asher knows I sometimes like to go back five, seven, eight years into his Hodinkee comments and just copy and paste them and
send them to him on WhatsApp. And frankly, I deserve it. Because the truth is, I was making grand proclamations about things in the same way that this person was that were based purely on my emotional feeling about a thing, not my actual understanding of it. You know, and this to me really, I think, encapsulates one of the greatest lessons that I've learned transitioning from an enthusiast and a collector into being somebody in the business.
I assure you, I assure you without talking to Arkin or Ann Ordain or any of these guys, that if they were able to sell you a watch today, they would. Heck, I think that's even true about 99.9% of every Rolex AD that you walk into. If they had a Submariner to sell you, they would love to sell it to you. So despite, I think, excluding one, two, maybe four or five highly specific cases, most people can't sell something to you because they don't have it, because they were unable to produce as much.
And this is the key point. And originally, the concept was that in order to stay a quote, member of collective, you'd have to buy a watch from us every two years. And of course, that was an unrealistic and unreasonable thing to ask anybody to do, especially since we were so eclectic in the kinds of things that we were producing. There was no guarantee that every watch we made would appeal to somebody.
By the way, isn't it hilarious that 50 people bought that first watch regardless of that stupid requirement? Like, truly, bless their hearts. I mean, I have nothing but gratitude to those people because they set us on a path to doing what we do. So truly, the depth of my gratitude to those people is extraordinary. But the reason I bring it up is that's not sustainable. And early on, there was always this question of like, I'm really worried I won't be able to get one of your collaborations.
I don't think you'll make enough of them. But what I don't think I realized at the time, because I was like, oh, we'll always make enough for everybody. Well, the thing about that is I still have to buy them. Gabe still has to buy them. So going back to the point here, the reason we stopped doing that was because it was untenable on both sides.
And this comment in particular, I think, highlights that assumption that, oh, Arkin should just go out and make 10,000 watches so that when I choose I'm ready to buy it, it's available to me. But that, of course, presupposes that Arkin has the financial capability to make all those watches, have lost access to that cash flow for the period of time that is necessary to produce the minimum order quantity, or in this assumption here, the maximum order quantity.
Or even simply has access to that capital or can good conscience take that risk? Exactly. So the presumption of like, if I go back here to quote, what annoys me with micro brands, though, what annoys me with micro brands, though, is limited capacity and unwillingness to invest and expand production to meet demand. End quote. I understand why that's annoying to a customer who wants something. If you, however, walk across the street, that's an unreasonable ask.
And that's the core lesson here for me, is what is a reasonable expectation of a partner? What is a reasonable expectation of a customer? And what is a reasonable expectation of myself? And how do we try our best to align those things in a way where you don't make a client have to wait an inordinate amount of time for something if you don't have to, but you also don't ask a brand to do something that is untenable.
Or alternatively, as a consumer, you don't hold an expectation that is impossible if you are unwilling, and this is the flip side of it, if you are unwilling or unable to make a commitment to them too. And this is something that I think is a really interesting dynamic to explore. And, you know, when I look at this statement, there's a couple other things that we can pull out, right? One of the things that I do wonder about, too, is around communication.
So let's talk about Ann Ardain for a second in that context, right? Lovely people. We've been next to them at several shows. We have witnessed some people being, shall we say, less than polite to them. But the irony is that they're actually some of the most transparent folks out there when it comes to telling you about how long it's going to take to deliver your watch. They're not gaslighting you.
That's how long it takes. Because that's how many, they have X amount of people who can make X amount of dials at the quality level that they can make them. And that's the capacity that they can produce. There is no supply chain that they can increase because their, quote, supply chain are trained, talented enamel artists that have taken years to get to the level that they're at. So it's not like it's not like you want to make more cars. You can just go buy.
Well, actually, it's a terrible analogy, too. It's not like if you want to make more pencils, you just go buy more wood. It's not, you know, I'm sure someone who makes pencils on the pod is going to be like, actually, but it's shocking how little you appreciate about pencil production. Exactly. You'll pay for that. I will. Sorry. Sorry to the powerful pencil lobby. But my point is, they can't increase their supply chain.
So yeah, I get why it's frustrating for it to take, you know, if you want a Kari Voodoo line and it's going to take eight years for a Vant8 now, or if you want a Model 2 from Anodyne, it's going to take four years or five years or whatever it is. I get it. That stinks. Flip side of that, though, is that's not a reputable problem.
Not really. Because if you ask the brand to scale for the expectation of production today, imagine for one second if they had done that in 2021 and they had modeled their hiring and their buying based off of the frenzy that we saw in the middle of the watch buying bubble. I venture to say a lot of those businesses would have either laid everybody off or gone under.
So it's tough to look at a company, whether it's Arkin or Interdane or anyone for that matter, and say, I'm frustrated with you and I'm offended that you haven't taken extraordinary financial risk to allow me the opportunity to buy if I so choose, when I so choose. So there has to be a balance there. So I really...
It's been a really interesting lesson to take away because I have one foot in both worlds and I understand the frustration that's being that's being said here, you know, by this guy or woman or whoever wrote it. And I also have tremendous amount of empathy for the flip side of that, knowing a lot of the smaller brands that we work with and like they're they work as hard as they possibly can to get us everything in as much quantity as
they can, as quickly as they can and as efficiently as they can. And I know it's hard. So a lesson for me here really comes around to having that circumspect perspective because there's a difference between buying a luxury good and being a patron of an art form. And I would argue if you love independence, if you love micro brands, you're really a patron.
And being a patron means having not just a passion for the end product, but a tremendous amount of love and empathy and respect for the process of getting there. And that's a lesson I don't think I actually really understood or fully got until I crossed the Rubicon into being a retailer. And I'm glad because it's helped me have a more circumspect perspective. So I've got a related lesson that similarly is kind of this two-sided lesson.
It's a lesson both about the industry and a lesson about the customer and the enthusiast as well. So everyone who's built a career in sales will be cheering at this, which is to say, like, I never worked a day selling anything. I've had plenty. That's not true. TechServe. Well, okay, sure. But my career, my work really prior to doing this was, you know, I had corporate jobs, essentially. And I don't think I fully appreciated...
The skill of being a good salesperson. I just sort of assumed, I think like a lot of people who don't really work in sales, like, oh, being a salesperson is easy. You just are helpful. And you know, you have something people want to buy and it kind of sells itself and you make that happen and whatever.
That of course is very naive. That's not true. Sales is a real skill, is a real craft and is something that Asher, both you and I learn every day and probably has been And one of the most humbling skills we've had to, we've, we've learned that we need to really work on and in working on being a good salesperson. And this isn't about like cheesy sales tactics or manipulating people or like, that's just gross.
We don't do that. That's not what this is about. In fact, our retail business is really motivated by being the opposite of that and, and being the antidote to so much of what is wrong with watch sales and luxury watch sales. But in being a salesperson, you start to observe some kind of patterns and customers on the other side, some customer behaviors that you need to figure out how you're going to deal with and what strategy you have to deal with.
And the biggest one I've learned that we need to kind of deal with in the the industry in a broader sense needs to deal with is this customer mindset of.
Which is people want what they can't have. So this is kind of the opposite side of the coin you just shared, which is, you know, a lot of times, and I feel this way too as a watch enthusiast, like we get frustrated by the things we can't have, whether it's a three-year wait on an Anordane or a Rolex Submariner we want, or the list goes on and on. Like that's frustrating and that is real and that's really annoying.
And I get it. because I want a lot of those things too, and I can't have them. And I share the outrage. However, what I've seen is as a retailer, a lot of times those things start to become more available. People all of a sudden want them less. And so I think there's a real question we need to ask ourselves as watch enthusiasts, which is how much of the things we want are being driven by scarcity versus genuinely a desire for that thing.
And I don't know that there's an answer here, but I have truly and really observed time and time again, and this is something we talk to other retailers about, and these might be people who are selling very hot, very desirable things that have been considered hype watches, who are telling us, you know, it used to take one phone call to sell whatever watch it might be. And now they're having to go one, two, three, four, five people deep on their list or more to sell those things.
Because all of a sudden, now that they're available, people are less interested. And I don't know what this means, but it's been really interesting to see that phenomenon that people both get frustrated by, as you were describing, what they can't have, but then when they can have it, they don't want it. So...
And this is probably a good thing for us to end on. But I think this comes around to another core lesson that I don't have an answer to because it is in many ways, I think, like the grand riddle of the industry that we're in, which is what do we define luxury as, as a company? And what does luxury mean or feel like to the client?
I know what luxury feels like to me as a client. You know, I know what what makes me feel uncomfortable in a boutique or, you know, buying a car or whatever, you know, experience I'm in. And of course, my definition of luxury is not the be all and end all and maybe quite profoundly different from somebody else's. So I'll give you an example.
I am not very comfortable in a ultra high end watch boutique where I'm immediately sat down and poured a glass of champagne or something like to me, that makes me feel like I immediately owe something to that, that boutique. And it makes me very uncomfortable if I'm just going in. That's a sales tactic. I appreciate that. But what was the book about selling that's basically, I think one of the sales tactics that a lot of people use is if you give someone
something, they tend to therefore feel indebted to you. But that's the worst reason to make a purchase. Well, see, but this is my point. I don't know that it is. Because I think for some people... Guilds is powerful, Asher. I'm a New York Jew, man. I get it. But I think my point is... That's an experience and a definition of luxury that does not resonate with me.
But to other clients, it may in fact resonate quite profoundly because they may in fact be seeking out that level of service and experience and detail. And that encapsulates luxury for them and therefore puts them in a mindset that makes it feel like the investment they're making is commensurate with the experience that they're having. And then there's other folks who define luxury in other ways.
And I think one of the most interesting things that I've taken away from all of this is that there are so many different ways and so many different kinds of clients who value so many different things. And opening my eyes to what somebody wants and how their experience should be crafted to make them happy with what they're doing and feel excited about what they're buying has also helped me solidify what I think our definition of luxury can and should be.
And it's not what I would have thought five years ago. Like five years ago, if you had asked me, I probably would have been like, oh my God, it's all about this incredibly complex packaging that we you know that you received remember we discussed this it was like we were gonna have this incredible like magical box you were gonna open and da da da da and then like you know and we're gonna build these clubhouses and they're gonna
have this like really specific field and all of that it's not to preclude like our our you know us being creative with packaging in the future or building clubhouses or whatever but what i've learned is like those are tactics.
The ultimately the thing that like defines luxury for us is access not necessarily access to the watch because as we discussed a moment ago, like that may or may not be possible for a thousand reasons, but access to Gabe, access to me, access to collective and access to a responsive, knowledgeable and enthusiastic person who want, you know, who is there to talk to you about the thing that you are most interested and excited about and you
want to learn more about because it's unusual and it's rare and it's not always easy to get all that info. Yeah. And for some people, that is luxurious. For other people, that might be 100% not what they want. What they want is really nice mint tea in China inside a boutique with marble floors. And that's not and never will be us because it's not who Gabe and I are or how we like to think about that experience, but doesn't discount that experience.
So it's just been really interesting for me to look at something and say, I'm not comfortable with that, and I don't want that personally, but I'm not going to judge anybody who does because luxury is about ultimately, you know, whether it's art or whatever, is about investing in something that gives you joy and pleasure. And how that manifests for you as a client is okay. And you should seek out whatever partner and authorized dealer meets the brief for you on that.
And that's why I think we are so dedicated to like wanting to do things our way because we're like, there are clients out there who are excited about the way that we work and the way that we do that. And there's a reason why, I mean, look at what we're doing right now. I mean, this is a very transparent, honest conversation that I'm sure other authorized dealers would never in a million years do. And that's part of, but this is access. This is access to the way that we think
and the way that we run our business. And I view that as luxurious. So it's just interesting to look at the different definitions and, and not hold them in judgment of each other, but to look at them and, you know, and analyze them as isolated, fascinating things. So one response to that, and then a final question for you. So I think one of my concerns with going inside the watch industry was that we would go native, right? We would drink the Kool-Aid. I still can't speak French, man.
In other words, a lot of industries are very navel-gazing. A lot of companies are very navel-gazing. Corporate politics, keeping up with your competitors, a lot of those things take over. And oftentimes you kind of forget about why you did it in the first place or your customer and what they really want, all that sort of stuff.
And I think the longer we've been in the industry, the more we have made a decision that we are going to set ourselves apart and be different from it and not necessarily subscribe to those conventional versions and views of what it means to be a watch retailer or an authorized dealer and do our own version of it. And we've actually become more comfortable with that, not less.
And I think that's been surprising because my fear was like, oh, no, we're going to go native and we're going to turn into another sort of also ran watch dealer. And I'm glad I'm glad at least so far that doesn't seem to have happened. So my final question about going inside the watch industry, and I've got a very quick answer to this, is has it changed how you collect and approach watches as an enthusiast?
For me, it fundamentally hasn't. The watches and the kinds of watches that are in my personal collection are pretty much either the same or in the same family as the kinds of stuff I was collecting and interested before.
Before so and that's been interesting to me like i thought like my eyes have been opened up about so many more watches and my mind has been opened to all sorts of different watchmakers and approaches to watchmaking but my personal collecting really hasn't changed and that's been surprising for me i'm curious about for you oh yeah mine totally has changed but not i think for but for slightly bizarre reasons. So for example, I used to buy tons of watches.
I've bought hundreds of watches in my life. And a lot, and that, you know, a lot of that was driven by just obsession and excitement, but part of it also, or maybe that was your way of being a good customer. You did more than just write a Yelp review here and there. Exactly. I, I, I spent, well, anyway, you supported the livelihoods of many in this industry. Bless your heart, Asher. Thank you. Anyway, point I'm making is.
One way I would justify that to myself, and I'm sure it did have this impact, was by experiencing the hundreds of watches that I did, it has helped inform not only what I want to carry in this store with you, but also helped me be a better, I'm not a watch designer, but helped me write better briefs for watch design because I had a much better idea of... A much better idea of what I thought was excellent in the metal.
I buy a lot less watches now personally because I buy, along with you, so many watches professionally. So I get to handle so many more watches than I ever would have because of being an authorized dealer. So I buy for myself far fewer pieces because I get to be around so many of these. And what it's also done for me, which is interesting, is because I was always so aggressively collecting as a collector, very few watches really got lived in for like consecutive months at a time.
Whereas now, as my collection has like really been pared down to stuff that I cannot fathom ever getting rid of, I wear them so much more. And that I think has been a really wonderful gift.
Gift so i get to play proverbial house with what's in the safe not that i wear the watches that are unworn of course but you know i get to look at them and enjoy them and then the watches that i do own i enjoy all that much more because of it you used to describe yourself as going through watches like a chainsaw through butter that was a good one and that's probably as good a place as any to leave it so should we leave it there let's do it all right thanks for listening
This is Open Work, a production of Collective Horology. And if you would like to go through watches like a chainsaw through butter, visit us at collectivehorology.com. To get in touch with your suggestions, your feedback, or questions, just email us at podcast at collectivehorology.com.