Newer Watch Brands-cost-quality disconnect

8/9/2019 Newer Watch Brands-cost-quality disconnect

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Newer Watch Brands --Cost-Quality Disconnect

Srinivasan Nenmeli Ph D

Several new watch brands, started by young

hopefuls and fashion brands have entered the

over-crowded watch industry. They strive to

capture some market share by fancy and

attractive dials or 'niche markets" such as

sports or military/field watches or high

end 'radio/GPS" synched tune ups. Some are

adding newer sensors--for temperature,

pressure, heart rate and so on into the tiny

space of a watch dial. Some imitate the

"I-Pad" revolution with touch screen

technology for watches. It is a moot point

where many of the brands would end up in the

near future--say in the next 5 years.


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Technological Pointers

Modern ,improved technology relentlessly

drives the watch industry. Here are some of

the innovative /inventive technologies that

are the sources of strength for new and old

brands:

1 Solar powered watches--either deriving

energy from sun light or from room light;

they can store up to 6 months of energy to

run a quartz watch. Pioneered by Seiko and

later by Citizen ["eco-drive " series],solar

watches are available in several brands

,though newer smaller ones are yet to cash

in on this. My favorite 'faithful' brand


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CASIO has several solar powered watches for

as little as $35/- {retail price].

It is surprising that several large makers,

such as 'Titan' and 'Armitron' are yet to

make forays into solar-powered

watches....You could make this 'green tech'

work for the globe, reducing millions of

batteries being dumped carelessly in many

countries.

2 "Lithium-ion batteries" --or simply

'lithium batteries' as you find in lap tops,

a product of space programs in the 1970's,

is increasingly used in watches. Many makers

offer watches with 10 year battery life, for

both analog and digital watches. Consider a


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$10 digital watch with 10 year battery life

from "Casio" stables.[Models W201 and W96H

for example. Models like EF106, analog, also

has 10 year battery.] I used to spend $3 or

more for battery replacements every few

years. Earlier Casio offered watches with 5

year battery life and I used one Casio watch

with the same battery for 8 years.

Lithium battery had some safety issues due

to fire accidents , but they have been

resolved. Still some parcel carriers do not

accept such watches in their air cargo! The

trend ,however, is for Li batteries in

watches, if not solar-powered. This trend

would reduce again battery consumption all


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over the globe. [A typical Li battery CR1216

costs about a dollar in Amazon.]

3 Case materials --plastic/resin,stainless

steel, aluminium ,gun metal and titanium.

For several decades, we had watches with

plastic/resin case or stainless steel,

though TIMEX had favored gun metal [a copper

alloy] for cases while some use brass cases.

I had been wondering why aluminium was not

used at all for light watches. The watch

brand "Haurex" from Italy, with their fancy

designs, introduced aluminium cases. Now I

find CASIO has a few models with aluminum

cases--for instance , Model MTP 1342.


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Aluminium has about 1/3 rd density of steel

and therefore watches would be much lighter.

Note that aluminum had been used for many

decades for rotating bezels in diver

watches.

The latest trend is titanium cases.

Titanium is about half the density of steel.

It is highly corrosion resistant and should

appeal to sailors and navy personnel who

need watches while sailing in saline

atmospheres.

Again SEIKO and CITIZEN take the credit for

making affordable titanium watches in the

first place, in $100-$200 price range. I

find another innovative start up company


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"BERTUCCI" [Minnesota based] is making

titanium watches for their military/field

watch category in the USA at reasonable

prices. I am yet to assess the quality of

their products.

I am sure many would follow this trend by

forging titanium pieces for watch cases.

Some Chinese companies must be already

trying on their small anvils for titanium

cases!

Here is a suggestion: make watch cases out

of sterling silver,as they used to make

Parker pens. You can plate it with gold or

other metals easily.


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4 Luminous paints or "Lume". While leaving

radioactive tritium tubes for lighting hands

and markers to very expensive brands like

'Luminox", affordable watches have luminous

paints,improving their brightness and the

duration of glow at night. "Lumebrite" by

Seiko is a great improvement.

5 Background dial light: "Elctroluminescent

back light " was first introduced by TIMEX

in their "Indiglo" lights which won

recognition during the "Sep -11" disaster

at WTC, in New York city. One person used

this light to help descend the stair case in

the burning towers. TIMEX sales shot up.

Casio uses the same technology in one of


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their models : 'Forester FT 500" series. But

for the large part most makers use LED light

or LCD background to illuminate the dial .

LED lights glow from one side and consume

less power. Many Casio watches use LED

lights even in their low-end $10-$20 models!

6 Digital vs analog or 'combo' ana-digi

displays.

Analog displays are more complicated and

take more power from the battery. In a

quartz watch, the vibrations from a

"pulsating quartz crystal" ["piezo-electric

effect" discovered by Pierre Curie, (husband

of Marie Curie] is translated into


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mechanical movement of hands by a gear

train. This is much like your car which

takes the piston movements in the engine and

uses a gear and transmission chain to move

the wheels-both front and rear suitably.

The gear train movement takes lot of power

and also may go wrong after some years.

Watches with center second or three hands

consume more power and your battery would

last only for 2 to 3 years. It is indeed an

engineering marvel how the gear train works

smoothly for several years. [Mechanical

watches need lot of maintenance every 5

years and do not provide much accuracy

,compared to even an inexpensive $10 quartz


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watch. Typically quartz watches exhibit an

accuracy [gain or lose] of 2 to 3 seconds a

month! Some quartz ones are of greater

accuracy than this!!

There has been no great progress in quartz

movement as such,except that plastic parts

are increasingly used since the

"quartz crisis" blew up thirty years ago and

hit the Swiss watch industry like a tsunami.

A few words about digital and ana-digi

displays. You can add up several features in

a digital watch-such as alarm,stop watch,

count-down timer,world time ,dual time,built

in calendar . Casio introduced all these in

their $20 watch since early 1980's. Many new


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comers to watch design are yet to introduce

these features. It costs very little energy

for these features.

But many watch users prefer analog display

with two or three hands . So Casio came up

with ana-digi combo watches--best of both

the worlds . But in most models, the digital

window is rather small and may strain your

eyes. Yet,they are useful features to go

with. Also look up the data bank in some

digital Casios.You can store up addresses

and so on.

7 Ion--plating technology

Using this technology,several color coating


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can be deposited on stainless steel. This

has been applied to watch casings. You can

have rose-gold coating as well. While

ion-plated cases on many watches ,especially

black or brown coatings, are available, many

of them may get worn out easily. The quality

of such coatings have not been standardized.

Therefore caution must be used in the daily

usage of such watch cases. It is better to

go for plain stainless steel [polished or

brushed ]finish in watch cases.

8 Water resistance: This is a ticklish issue

in watches. The term 'water resist' may only

indicate water resistance of 10 meters or 30


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meters depth in a standardized test. Dive

watches have 200 meters or more in terms of

water resistance or WR.

A WR of 50 meters may be adequate for

handwashing and showering. For swimming,

diving and snorkeling, read the

instructions.

Even here,cost alone is not the indicator.

There are inexpensive Casio watches with WR

of 50 m or 100 m [for instance w201 has WR

of 50 m.]But expensive watches of newer or

fashion brands, costing $100 or more, may be

only WR of 30 meters. Again there is no

simple relationship between cost and value

in watch industry!


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Why and How of new brands of varying

quality?

WHO ARE THE NEW PLAYERS?

Some of the 'new kids around the block' in

watch making are: Bertucci, Momentum, MVMT

'Movement' , Breda, Haurex and others.

They all wish to capture the dress/fashion

watch segment. Some are focused on sports

watches , outdoor/field activities,water

sports, using titanium cases.

They use Japanese movements or low-end Swiss

movements [Ronda 505 ,for instance].They are

yet to master high quality diver [water

resistance] performance , as Casio or Seiko

could provide. That would be a considerable


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challenge at low cost. As for dress watches,

the tech skills of newcomers may be

adequate. Can they include Lithium battery

with 10 year life? Much testing and

reliability work is required before they can

compare themselves with any of the Japanese

giants in watch industry and compete for

niche markets. We have to 'watch' and see!

The availability of cheap Chinese quartz

movements , rather inexpensive Japanese

quartz movements and low -cost movements

from "swiss quartz" makers have encouraged

many entrepreneurs to jump in and try their

hands in quartz watch industry. It is easy

to procure almost all parts from China or


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one of the south Asian countries and

assemble in far-east countries at low

cost--in China, Philippines, Malaysia, India

and so on. Several well known brands

,including Seiko,Casio, Timex ,

Sturhling-Original shifted their assembly

units to these countries.This had helped to

keep the price very,very low.

Quality Issues--How to assure and maintain

Quality?

It is easy to set up a design office with a

few computers and design software [CAD

systems] in Europe or in USA and proudly

claim that the design reflects latest trends

or some heritage borrowed from Germany or


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Swiss or Italy or Americana, while bulk of

the manufacturing takes place in Asia, with

little or no quality control or quality

assurance efforts.

They may hire a few designers from Italy

or Northern Europe to lend high sounding

name for their products. Some cleverly

resurrect German or Swiss names that were

known for a century or two in the watch

industry, but were folded up long ago. They

build their watches with poor practices or

quality control/assurance methods. I know of

one company started by a Chinese businessman

and a popular brand in Asia with watches

sold in malls bearing a Italian name ,but


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having no connection with Italy whatsoever.

The poor quality of the watches of this

brand was regularly reported by consumers.

While 'old faithful' brands like Seiko,

Citizen,Orient and Casio are able to

maintain their quality levels,newer brands

are yet to learn the ropes --how to improve

quality and maintain quality from their

Asian manufacturing and assembly units.

[Shinola watches are made in Detroit but

quite expensive compared to Swiss brands

like Tissot.]

A quartz watch is an intricate ,precision

instrument that should be built to last at

least for 3 to 5 years to achieve customer


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satisfaction. Note that 'achieving customer

satisfaction' is one of the definitions of

"quality".

Most of the newer brands ,especially the

'fashion house 'brands which also sell

apparel, shoes and handbags ,with high style

advertising, have no consistent quality

levels. One out of 100 time pieces may be

defective or fail early in such brands.

Read the customer reviews in websites like

that of Amazon and you would realize the

poor quality of "high priced" fashion brand

watches. In these reviews, if N reviews are

given with 5 stars, nearly N/3 reviews would

be of 4 stars .


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[I am not denouncing Chinese brands as

such;some brands like 'Sea Gull ' with ST

16 (mechanical movement) and TSS brand

quartz watches are of some value to merit

consideration.]

I have tried a few brands of fashion watches

in the US and have been totally

disappointed.

It is not easy to achieve high quality

levels in watch manufacture..Period.

Note that watch parts are very tiny and they

are packed in a small volume. The quality of

components must be high to ensure proper

assembly and functioning over several years.

A wrist watch is not a static instrument


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like your wall clock. It is moved,oscillated

and banged or dropped a few times in its

life cycle and exposed to water and rain. It

has to be built well to last for many years.

In this scenario, it is indeed marvellous

that even low cost Casios can hold up and

deliver great service, as a clear proof of

what can be achieved.

CASIOS-WHY I ADMIRE THEIR WATCHES?

I am not a seller or agent or advertiser for

Casio company. I am not paid by them. I buy

their watches from regular sellers in the

USA or Asia, like anybody else. Note that I

also buy watches of several other brands,

including high end Swiss watches like Tissot


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and Rado .

My first CASIO digital watch of $15 model ,

bought from a departmental store in the US,

lasted nearly 8 years.I have been using

their watches-chronographs, Enticer-Edifice

collection ,G shock , dive watches for many

years. None of them failed to provide

satisfaction. That speaks volumes on the

quality level of Casio and also on the

possibility of achieving such a

technological sophistication in modern

times. [One can compare the quality levels

of Toyota cars and Honda cars with

Casio/Seiko/Citizen/Orient watch family.]

Where the mushroom brands and newer brands


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fail?

Many modern brands, including the fashion

house brands, do not reveal the names of

their movements. Some merely state that it

is 'japan movement' or 'swiss quartz'. If no

mention is made ,assume that it is a Chinese

movement.It is also hard to find the name of

the country where the watches are assembled,

though some brands state in Amazon

description.

While the movement itself may be of good

quality at some price level, the other

components and assembly may be of poor

quality for the newer brands. In general,

the build [mechanical parts and their


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alignment] is of poor quality. I guess that

they skip adequate testing porcedures for

reliability. As a result, the parts fall off

or malfunction after a short time.

Customers Beware!!

In this situation, there is no simple

correlation between cost and quality. A $15

Casio watch may show greater quality and

provide greater service than a $100 fancy

watch of a New York or London based outlet

brand. Read the reviews and do some

research. Do not go by attractive dial and

band alone. The disconnect between price and

quality is unimaginable in the watch

industry.


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I only hope that makers of high quality

watches emerge from the newer brands.

About the author:

The author is a lover of watches and a watch

collector. He had been a quality and

reliability specialist in Aero-space field.

He holds a doctorate in engineering from

Columbia University, New York. He is settled

in USA.

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Newer Watch Brands-cost-quality disconnect

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