Yesterday morning I went to a board meeting. I was wearing my usual gear, which included my trusty Apple Watch Series 4.
And as I sat at the meeting, I noticed that some attendees had expensive watches on. You know the watches – Rolex Submariner, Omega Seamaster, [insert other standard luxury watch here]. I noted it and moved on. (I have one of my own that rarely comes out.)
Then after the meeting, I went for a coffee in Caffe Nero. There, I overheard two people discussing how expensive watches are for “twats”. I didn’t completely agree with their logic, but it made me think. What is the point of a luxury watch in the 21st Century?
With the Apple Watch, I can tell the time accurately, but I can also do a ton of other stuff. It’s a key workout companion, for example. And it’s full of personal health data which is, at the very least, curious. What can a luxury watch do better?
Which led me to the conclusion that – unless you are a die hard fan of luxury watch craftsmanship – a luxury watch must be about making a heavy fashion or status statement.
“Yeah, yeah” – I hear you say – you only “like what it looks like”. That may be so. But you are putting your head in the sand if you don’t acknowledge that it also says, to many people, “I spent serious money on this watch and I am classy, fashionable and/or doing very well”.
And how many people nowadays recognise that statement as a positive thing?
In a world of t-shirt wearing billionaires, the expensive watch seems a bit 20th Century. It can be overtly show-off. And the risk of going to a meeting and the person on the other side of the chat misinterpreting your statement, and thinking you are a knob, is at an all time high. Why take the risk?
Of course, you may not care what other people think about you. Credit to you. But that doesn’t stop the fact that people will think things, and what people think is, ultimately, important. No man is an island.
It seems to me that the risk of wearing a luxury watch nowadays (for better or worse) carries a higher chance of negative judgment than any benefit you receive from it.
It’s easy to avoid this issue. Just put on an Apple Watch, Fitbit, Casio, Swatch, Timex etc. They are classless. Why? Simply because they are very common. Their statement is diluted by the vast variety of wearers. The collateral benefit is that no one will feel they can have an (unentitled) opinion on you based solely on something as lame as your watch.
So yeah. Just a thought. Maybe you will consider it when you are next deciding between your watches. Or maybe you could not care less about what other people think about your watch, even considering this. You may have much better things to worry about. And fair play to you (and congrats for getting to the end of a post you don’t care about).
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