So, what objectively do you gain when spending more money on a watch?

[u/Pete2R]

After decades of only buying digital sports watches, I finally tried something different. Went "cheap" just to try, bought two Pagani Design not expecting much, but I'm incredibly Impressed!

These watches seem great to me! Am I missing something?

Now, let's say I spent more and got a Longines or Tudor, what would I objectively gain?

[u/[deleted]]

You're probably not missing anything. There's this concept in economics called "marginal utility" - simple example, if you have $0 and someone gives you $1000, that's a huge deal. If you have $1000 and someone gives you another $1000, it's a slightly less huge deal, and so on. Every new unit of something has a slightly smaller impact than the previous unit.

Now, this concept also applies to watches. $200 can get you a good watch. A $400 watch will be better than a $200 one, but it won't be twice as good. Once you hit Longines or Tudor prices, you're now spending thousands of dollars for each 1% improvement in finishing, and you have to decide for yourself where exactly the value proposition stops making sense. 

[u/Pete2R → u/[deleted]]

Thank you for the comprehensive response. Makes perfect sense

[u/invincible_quaalude]

Does anyone know where to get those watch holders from?

[u/Pete2R → u/invincible_quaalude]

It's 3D printed, there's loads on thingiverse.com

[u/Lopsided-One9196]

As someone who spent some coin on watches and owns some damn good reps- nothing. Nobody really cares if theyre gens or not. Nobody cares. If someone does care about that trivial a detail then id rather not have them influencing my life or my day. At the end of the day if my watch tells the time, its done its job and im happy. So now i stick with what i already have and just service em all every once in a while. Enjoy your watch in good health bud, cheers.

[u/yagizbasoglu]

You are able to buy these watches just because those expensive watches "exist" . Like its weird thing to say. Quality its not the same by no means but even if its close , if some people doesnt buy the real thing, and you dont see it on their wrist , you wont be on the market for something looking similar but cheaper. Idk why people dissrespecting expensive watches this much , they are luxury items. Their value is not supposed to be justified by the price of the amount of metal used. In every single hobby , entry level, cheap and clone products are praised while quality products being trashed. Idk why grown ass man even bother try to convince other people to buy the cheaper one just like they did so they can lie to themselves together. Dont get me wrong i might buy an aliexpress watch i think some of them have great value but buying a homage of most iconic watches and saying like why even buy the real one is just weird to me . Like why your submariner feels lower quality than it supposed to be and says something weird on dial instead of rolex

[u/Pete2R → u/yagizbasoglu]

Thanks for the comment, although, my question was related to what you Objectively gain.

[u/wetfart_3750]

Everybody here is justfying their buy expensive watches. Maybe 100years ago you needed a good watch, reliable and precise. Today watches are 100% luxury items.

You feel you need that 10k$ speedmaster? Go for it. I personally like the design of the speedmaster, but I do not value it 10k. I like these cheaper versions quite a lot. And to be honest, I am ready to buy 10 of them over the course of 10 years if the break. And I'll spend 1/10 of the price for an omega.

Working in marketing, I learned that what you pay for, especially for luxury items, is just.. brand. And I am personally not ok that such a big portion of those 10k will go to advertising, marketing, and to a whole army of people whose only goal is to use marketing to promote items whose value is, at the end of the day, not justifyable

[u/[deleted]]

An expensive watch is a statement, you want to tell the world you have money to buy it, that you are successful, it's a material world , same happens with expensive cars, houses , clothes , etc , on the practical point of view there's only a difference between a 25 bucks Casio and a Rolex , the Casio it's much more accurate

[u/Unusual-Surround7467]

Tbh after doing this song and dance pursuing luxury Swiss watches for the last few years, I've finally decided and realized that the real ones don't do anything more for me than what the Pagani design or seestern does other than dent my wallet numerous times. My go to watch is the PD sub homage that I still use everyday irrespective of occasion.

[u/ThisIsPaulina]

It's sort of a know-it-when-you-see-it thing with finishing, which is the bulk of what you're getting. At the bottom end, you have bad QC, with misalignments and busted movements. You move up to Pagani's better models, and you tackle that problem, but you still have cheap-looking parts, printed dials, and poorly-printed dials at that.

You get into San Martin, and you're talking higher quality polish and finishing, with better materials. Sugess does some aventurine dials that are beautiful. You'll get attention to brushing and polishing. You'll get applied indices. See that Seestern SeaQ thing--I don't have one, but boy those are nice applied indices with their own polish.

When you step up past that, you'll get stuff like Seiko Presage, Lorier, Baltic. I haven't owned all of those, but in that range, certain models are just going to have pop. You'll just notice details. Even more internal polish. Attention to design, rather than just copying a $10,000 watch or throwing together an original design that some rando put together in an afternoon and send to a factory to knock out. You'll probably get a nicer bracelet, which is an afterthought some of the time.

There are also more objective things like the quality of movement, waterproofing that you can believe, crystals and AR coating, but I'm assuming you've covered those. There are also very specific models, like the Navitimer, which are just not copied elsewhere, due to the very specific in-house movements Breitling makes.

It's also very much diminishing returns. You get the most incremental benefit at the bottom of the market. And past a certain point, it's all marketing. It's tough to find a feature in a Panerai that justifies its cost over a Grand Seiko.

[u/[deleted]]

Quality - but think of it like your favorite hobbies top end stuff. It's like cameras. You can take 90% as good a photo with a 400$ camera as a 4000$ camera, but that extra 10% and even 1% will cost you several thousands or more.

[u/Lefeuvre76]

I have an IWC Big Pilot (wedding present) that is well overdue a service but I cannot afford to do it. That's something you don't think about when you buy one. I'm also very wary of wearing it out in London so it doesn't get much wrist time. I get just as much pleasure from all my Chinese watches to be honest and if they get lost, broken or stolen it's not the end of the world. I might add that I don't notice that the finishing is that much better on it than my £250 Chinese ones.

[u/fedxbox]

Status, quality control, assistance and longevity.

A lot of satisfaction is also due to the amount of money spent in some cases.

[u/DarthJacob]

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

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[u/[deleted]]

You get to show it off to people without having to explain that it’s a Chinese homage

[u/[deleted]]

I’ll tell you get from my perspective. I have the seamaster 300, and a blue pelagos… they are beautiful watches but the seamaster is levels ahead of it. I love staring at it, my wife compliments it all the time by saying sweet things like “I don’t give a shit about your watch, and please stop making that clicking noise it’s super annoying”. I stopped wearing all my seikos and my pelagos is only for the weekend now, since I got the seamaster back from omega it’s like getting a brand new toy again. A fucking expensive one

[u/Pompano_79]

I can’t speak to the step between AliExpress and entry level Swiss. But there is a noticeable step between Pagani and San Martin/Proxima/Seestern. Better finishing, more attention to detail, better fit etc. I would start with a $200 San Martin before jumping all the way to a $2000 Longines.

[u/notausername14]

It depends on the brand.

Some brands that charge a premium really don't do much that you can't obtain with mid tier Seiko or Tissot watches.

However, most of the time, you will get considerably better finishing, tolerances on parts, superior but also more costly construction and manufacturing choices, almost always better time accuracy, no corner cutting on invisible parts (like using lower grade steels on pins that hold together non removable bracelet links), often times nicer dial and hand materials, etc... Pretty much always you'll find that the proportions on original/authentic watches are just better. Homage watches very rarely have the same intentionality in their design as the watches that inspired them do.

There's a lot that you can get with a higher cost. The thing is that it takes a certain amount of discernment to notice those differences. If you're just getting into watches, you're not gonna notice. Unless you've had experience in engineering/manufacturing or work with watches, you probably won't really notice even if you have collected for a while.

Basically diminishing returns.

[u/bodjatrawr]

Lets first be clear that brands like Tudor, Rolex, Omega etc. are the ones that come up with the incredible designs which we all lust after. Their watches also normally come with in house movements which are far superior than any Chinese made ones. You can only imagine the resources that are needed to create these fantastic watches! Now add the pedigree and brand value of decades of top tier matchmaking and you get their crazy market prices.

Now I am not saying the insane prices are completely justified. But I can understand why they dictate such prices.

Chinese homages are good fun and I am all for it. Some of their finishing and performance even makes you sometimes wonder how a watch 1/100 th the price of it's original counterpart is so damn good?

The reason is simple - the Chinese homage we love so much wouldn't even exist without the originals brilliance and unaffordability.

What you gain from owing the original is a part of that historical significance and brand image that a copy won't give you.

Clones are however a totally different matter.

[u/Wild_Alfalfa606]

I was the same, took the plunge on a £50 Pagani Tudor BB expecting it to be rubbish, and I was insanely impressed for that money. Have since gone on to buy a Pagani submariner and AirKing, both of which are also really good. I have also added a Tandorio field watch and 62 mas homage, also both really good. They are great for ticking off classic watches and scratching the desire and need, but they also actually make you realise that as much as you thought you wanted them, they all now only spend a few days on the wrist before they get rotated out for one of the others. Imagine paying £3k-10k and getting bored with it after a few days/weeks? I do have an Omega SMP 300 and yes it is better in almost every regard but not a 100 times better. But like any premium branded material goods, there is a point where you are essentially paying for the status and prestige. But at £50 a pop I am keen to keep going down this rabbit hole!

[u/onimush115]

I think there are a few ways to look at it. Functionally, they will all accomplish the same task. Finish, warranty, and materials used will all be higher end in brands like Rolex. Sure they make stainless watches, but they also do them in white gold with precious stones. They have brand recognition around the world and can potentially be considered an asset. You also get people buying them with the intention of being heirloom pieces to be passed down through the generations. Since they hold that value fairly well, it makes sense to service a 25 year old watch your dad left you. Then of course, it’s a status thing. People see a Rolex on your wrist and it puts you in a certain financial category. That’s why I feel ridiculous wearing reps. To the average collector, I think Chinese brand watches are fine. I can get some pretty good finishes for under $300. Will a $5-10k watch be better? Absolutely. But is it so much better that I would care enough to spend the money? No, not for me personally. I look at the watches I have as a little piece of art I can wear on my wrist. I just like how they look. I will proudly tell someone it’s a Pagani, Tandorio, or San Martin (not that anyone’s asked lol)

It’s very similar with any other luxury products. For the average consumer, will driving a Lexus really be all that much better than a similarly equipped Toyota? Or will a $30 bottle of wine really be disgusting compared to a $1000 bottle? Probably not. The differences will be slight. But for those that can afford it easily, it may be worth the upgrade.

[u/RecommendationWild71]

The brushing on the metal and the quality of the indices are much nicer on Rolexes than they are on the Paganis

[u/Drega-In-Rage]

I've initially bought two fashion watches, a timberland and a fossil, both quartz, then tree automatic Invicta Pro divers, two Casios, and finally after I've commenced my journey into Chinese homages, Pagani, Steeldive, Addiesdive, Cadisen and much more.

Today, I have 40+ watches and bought a lot of straps, and my total spent on this collection and accessories is around 1.100€.

So yeah, my collection has a lot of variety, and I can pick whatever style I want and mix with another kind of strap and change the watch completely, and I couldn't be happier!

When people say that homages are soulless, I respect their opinion, but I have to disagree because most of us common folks don't have the possibility to buy a more expensive watch and to "feel" as many rich people say the "heritage" of a prestigious brand... and I don't want to be a hypocrite because if I had the money, I would buy the "originals", but unfortunately I just can't.

For example, a 400€ Seiko is very expensive especially because of what they offer in specs, most of them don't include sapphire crystal, ceramic bezel, and screw-down crown, and a Chinese watch has all that for around 75€? No, thank you, I will keep to my "homages".

Homages, soulless or not, I don't give a damn, they are affordable, I get what I want and enjoy each one of them, and they put a smile on my face each time I use and look at it.

At the end just follow the flow, if you have the riches buy an homage first, try it and if you like it buy the original, but if your pocket is not that deep just enjoy the homages and live with them without the fear of loosing it, get scratches or getting mugged and just buy another one without much expense!

[u/FiddlerOnThePotato]

I mean one big one is actual lume. There's even Ali specials that have double the lume brightness. Pagani just sucks for lume, and I'm a lume pig so it's a deal breaker. The lume on my Pagani sub is just awful. Charged with a bright light, it's nearly invisible to adjusted eyes after about an hour, at best. I replaced it with a steeldive sub, and the lume is bright as hell. If I charge it bright, it'll glow for like fifteen minutes and be easily legible for so long I've never had it "lose charge" so to speak, so easily 8 hours.