“Trusted Selling Partner” Program
Starting May 1, 2010 W-Precision introduced new “Trusted Trading Partner” program. The goal of this program is to offer a wider selection of products to our buyers.
We know how hard it is to make a large purchase online such as luxury timepiece. And in attempt to help our customers to gain confidence in online purchasing we authorized some independent sellers to list their products on our website. Only trusted sellers were qualified for this program; sellers who we work with and who we trust. Look for “Trusted Selling Partner” seal.
Quartz vs. Mechanical Watches
The revolution in the watchmaking industry came in the late 70s, when most of the manufacturers start using quartz movements in their timepieces. Quartz 
mechanisms, although very precise, were very cheap to manufacture. An opportunity to make watches that cost less and keep accuracy for as long as the battery is strong was very tempting for the most of the watch companies. Very quickly the traditional mechanical watch movements went into history.
However, the idea of simplified watches was not greeted with enthusiasm by all of the consumers. Just like Harley-Davidson in motorcycle industry or Shelby in the automotive industry, mechanical watch movements have become a symbol of good taste and class. The companies such as Rolex has tried to enter quartz industry with their Rolex Oysterquartz, but this attempt was failed and abandoned by Rolex just after a couple of years in production. Having a cheap watch movement in the luxury watch was greeted just as Honda engine in the Rolls-Royce – good idea but not respectable.
Four decades later, there are only a few places in the world where mechanical watch movements are still made. Among them Swiss made watches are the best. Companies like Omega and Breitling are using movements manufactured by ETA. Rolex and Patek Philippe are manufacturing their own mechanisms. Of course, there are movements from “Big Three” Japanese watch companies (Seiko, Orient, and Citizen), but the quality and finish of their products has changed dramatically: many plastic parts, a lot of cheap metals. And finally, there are several watch companies in the former Soviet Union (Vostok, Poljot, and etc.) which failed to adapt to the quartz revolution during the 70s and 80
s and up to these days manufacturing watches with all-metal mechanical movements, practically unchanged since the 50s.
Quartz watch is also the most unreliable investment. These watches, no matter what company has manufactured them, are losing their value very fast. For instance Omega Seamaster can be found with either quartz or automatic movement, and only the ones with mechanical movement will retain their value. Of cause Japanese and Russian mechanical watches are losing their value fairly quickly too, but they don’t cost much on the first place.
Rolex SA Is At War With Privet Sector
Rolex is not just the most famous watch brand, but it is also a very good money investment. Don’t get me wrong – any Rolex watch devalues with the time, but not as much as other watches. For instance a 30-year old Rolex 16014 will cost about 50% of its initial price. It is a very good “residual value”, certainly better than any other commodity on the market today (especially cars).
As a result the market is saturated with second-hand Rolex watches. You can purchase them with aftermarket additions (or 100% original if that is you goal), fully serviced and polished for much less than a brand new Rolex would cost in the store. Obviously, the watch collectors want their watches to be 100% original; it is a very honorable and understandable goal. But for the rest of us – just common people who want to have a luxury watch, but don’t want to pay thousands of dollars to get them the way that they want it? These people have to purchase “customized” watches. I have to admit that aftermarket additions are not all made equal, but the general rule “you get what you paid for” is usually true in most cases.
Remember good old days when eBay was a global “flea market” where you could find virtually anything. Well, these days are over. In the last decade eBay has grew into a massive corporation. And what corporations do? They try to maximize profits and minimize expenses; and while doing that they step on the throats of little fishes in the sea without even noticing them. This is the nature of any big business and there is absolutely nothing wrong with it. But in the last couple of months a new tendency has emerged: eBay started siding with other corporations in order for them to protect their market. EBay has launched a war against all the little used Rolex retailers. Let’s look at these events to prove my point:
- EBay has set a new rule stating that no new seller is allowed to list items with the word Rolex in the product subject line. Explanation was that this somehow will protect customers from counterfeits. I contacted eBay myself about this issue 2 years ago, and no eBay employee could explain to me how is it the reduction of the number of sellers will help their cause.
- EBay prohibited sellers from accepting any form of payment other than PayPal (and a few other minor “authorized” payment processors). Everyone on eBay lost their independence and got stacked with PayPal-eBay (which is the same company). The explanation was …. Exactly the same – “to protect the consumer”.
- PayPal start closing accounts of the sellers that sell Rolex watches or Rolex accessories. This is the most recent development and it is still in process. At the present moment PayPal has put three of my regular customers out of business. And in the near future this news will come to many more eBay sellers.
- Future action – closing left over eBay accounts that somehow survived the war.
Why is eBay doing it? EBay is losing millions in revenue from the sellers. It does not make any sense. Who are the winners in this war? EBay claims that the consumers will win, because they will be protected against dishonest sellers. Maybe, but the biggest winner in this game is Rolex SA. This company will be able to continue selling their diamond dials for $1500-2500 each with virtually no competition. Their diamond bezels will be sold for $3000 and more. But the most important is that Rolex will sell more new watches. EBay on other hand will have no consumer complaints – if there is no product – there is nothing to complain about. And, most likely, eBay has got paid by Rolex SA to conduct these actions. It is much better for eBay as a business to get a lump sum of money from one big company than generating many small amounts from various sellers.
How does the consumer benefits from all these? No explanation here. Consumers will lose.
Sincerely,
S. Scootsky
eBay Is No Longer The Place for Small Business
W-Precision has been selling on eBay for a very long time and had nothing but a positive experience from its customers. However, eBay in the last couple of yeas has become a very unfriendly place for sellers. Being very optimistic, we thought that eBay and PayPal will notice their self-destructive policy and change it, so buyers and sellers will stay confident in this wonderful marketplace.
However, we were wrong. Recently, eBay has removed some of our items on the fact that they were not sure if our dials are authentic. We tried to resolve this issue, even offered to send samples for investigation, but eBay left us completely ignored. On other hand PayPal imposed a reserve fund on our transactions – 10% of our daily sales.
Seeing mentioned above measures we were forced to look for eBay alternatives and came across Etsy. Sure Etsy gets less traffic and we are not sure if this website can even compete with allmigty eBay, but we thought to give it a shot.
Currently we listed only a few items (click on the link to visit www.etsy.com). Remember, this is only a marketing experiment and all of our products are still available at w-precision.net
Rolex Dials Avaliable from W-Precision
There are several types of Rolex dials, I will list them by popularity:
1. Rolex Datejust Diamond dials with 10 round stones:
A very simple and clean design for Rolex. To my taste this dial does not look like “too much” and it looks just like a diamond dial that comes on 100% factory Rolex dials. As an option we can use old or classic square diamond setting; we can use diamonds, rubies, sapphires, and emeralds. We never had any orders to make this dial with onyx stones (black stones0, but it is also an option).
On the edge we print Roman numeral track, but we can print railroad track, hash marks, or even nothing at all.
Don’t forget this is a custom dial and anything is possible, we always like to take custom orders.
2. Rolex Datejust Diamond dials with 8 round stones and 2 baguettes:
This design is inspired by Rolex Day-date President. Two baguettes are giving Rolex Datejust a more masculine look at the same time maintaining a clean and simple look.
Just as with all our custom rolex dials, this dial can be made with yellow or gold diamond settings and the color option is entirely up to our customer’s discretion.
THESE AND OTHER CUSTOM ROEX DIALS ARE ALWAYS AVALIABLE AT WWW.W-PRECISION.NET
3. Rolex Datejust Diamond dials with diamond string at the age:
Diamond String is our most complicated design, it literally takes days to make it look right. But the results are always remarkable and won’t leave you disappointed. unlike other refinishes, we hand-select each diamond – to make sure that they are almost identical and install them so there will be a straight line.
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“Rolex Certified Watchmakers” – a funny story
Hello my Friends.
Just wanted to share a funny story with you
Today I had a phone call from one of my customers, he purchased a Rolex diamond dial from me back in October and yesterday tried to install in on the watch with “certified Rolex watchmaker”.
I have to tell you that every time I hear “certified Rolex watchmaker” I start laughing. This is just the most common misleading title. What does it actually mean, no one knows. I have never heard of Rolex schools or Rolex certification programs. If there is such thing, how do you apply? Do you have to pass LSAT or GRE and have a GPA 4.2 or above? Where do you send an application? Perhaps to Geneva, after all that’s where Rolex is.
Anyway, that certified watchmaker took my customer’s authentic Rolex Datejust and my refinished diamond dial. Somehow he felt that legs of the back of the dial are unnecessary addition (sort of like on old soviet watches where you see the screw, but cannot figure out why is it there, because it makes no sense). So he cut legs…. Then it gets even crazier. For some reason he thought that he had to bend the hands… We all bend hands, but not the hour hand! It was totally unnecessary. The ultimate result of bending hour hand will be that you will have to bend the rest of the hands, and then install a new taller crystal gasket. Apparently, later he realized his own mistake and tried to fix the hands…. and broke them. His explanation to everything mentioned above was that dial is not good….
Today I have decided to call “certified Rolex watchmaker” myself and walk him through dial installation on Rolex Datejust. Turned out….. that he never worked on Rolex watches before….. Tomorrow I will have to ship a whole new dial for my customer, hopefully this time around there will be no problem.
Read more about how to chose a watchmaker for your Rolex at w-precision.net
Servicing Your Rolex
Rolex as a company never stopped surprising me even after long years of working with these beautiful watches. First of all their watches are celebrities of jewelry business. Everybody knows Rolex. Everybody wants Rolex. And our world is full of Rolex imitations.
What always amazed me is how Rolex owners treat their watches. They purchase special watch winders, to keep their watches winding during the night, special cloth to “polish” it. Take it to Rolex authorized dealer for unthinkingly expensive service. And all this done in the name of almighty Rolex!
I respect Rolex as a business for that. After all, just like any other business entity, Rolex wants to maximize its profit and the best way to do it, is for their customers to keep on coming back for more; if not to buy a new watch, then at least to service their timepieces.
I’m sure everyone has had an experience with purchasing a new car. Remember how the dealer tried to make you sign an extended warranty or service plan? Remember scary faces they were making when you were asking if servicing your car elsewhere will void factory warranty? Don’t know how about you, but it always amused me. Especially after you decide to check the work done by famous “highly trained” mechanics or “genuine parts” that they put in you car. My favorite one is “air filter replacement”: $60 – labor, $35 – parts. Wow! What can be easier then to replace an air filter on a car?! And what a nice profit margin on that $2 paper air filter! But for those who want to sleep well, overpaying and being played is an unavoidable.
Why am I mentioning cars? Because Rolex is doing exactly the same…. I am not trying to say that Rolex is using cheap parts why servicing you watch, but there is absolutely nothing supernatural about them. The oil and rubber gaskets are not any better from Rolex then from … let say Bergeon. A very skilled watchmaker can do a great job servicing your watch and for a fraction of what you would pay to Rolex. Most likely your watch won’t need to have any parts replaced – only oil and gaskets.
Of course some watchmakers are only good for replacing batteries in quartz watches. But there are many skillful masters out there. You just need to find one.
Sincerely,
S. Scootsky
Buying new dial for your Rolex
After reading a few guides on how to buy new dials for Rolex I have decided to write one of my own. It is a very touchy subject to many collectors. I would have to agree with the fact that installing aftermarket additions devalues Rolex watch, but not in all cases. To many people a Rolex watch is a collector’s item. And just like any collector’s items – Rolex watch should stay ALL original. But what if your watch is one of the millions of watches produced by Rolex Montres? Most likely it has no value to an antique buyers and it cost just as much as the others in the same category.
For example: If you are a proud owner of Rolex Datejust 16013 it will cost the same if it has an old boring silver stick dial, refinished or repainted dial, or even no dial at all. Most likely it will be impossible for you to sell it even at the fair market price, unless you polish, service it, and replace an old crystal. In this case you are free to do with it as much and as far as your imagination goes. I always compare watches to the cars. If you have a Mercedes-Benz from the 80s it is not an antique car yet. If you paint it, put new headlights, or re-alposter the seats it will be same car, only with an improved look. On other hand, if you have a Rolex 6536, I would suggest to keep it as authentic as you can.
What I would avoid is buying 100% fake dials for your watches. And not because they will devalue your watch, but because they will never work right with it. Watch is a very delicate mechanism; if you install in it something that doesn’t belong there it will have an affect on it. For instance, the most common problem with aftermarket dials for Rolex is calendar disc not “jumping” properly or doesn’t “jump” at all. These dials will take a very skillful watchmaker to make them work properly. And take my word for it – not every watchmaker knows how to fix watches!
Buying re-finished or re-painted dial is not a bad solution at all. They cost less, much less than all-original factory Rolex dials. If they were done right – they look almost as good as factory Rolex dials. And most importantly – they will work just fine with your watch. To refinish a watch dial is an art. First a dial needs to be polished, to remove it from the old paint, then new paint has to be applied in several layers and using special techniques which I cannot reveal here. Diamonds (if they are present on the dial) have to be all identical and professionally selected otherwise they won’t shine the way that they should and will make hands stuck on top of them (if they are too high). And lastly, every refinished dial needs to be cleaned up on the back, to remove any leftover paint, glue, or whatever else might be there – not cleaning it properly will affect dial’s functionality (unfortunately, this process will remove any original Rolex signs from the back of the dial, which is why it is pointless to look at the back of the re-finished dial trying to see if it is original).
Unfortunately, lately many sellers on eBay sell Rolex dials, not all of them are equal quality. See for yourself: if someone sells a refinished Rolex dial too cheap, there got to be a reason for it – maybe it is not authentic (basically fake), maybe not all stones are diamonds, maybe their “Rolex” prints is far from perfect. These people are giving a bad name to the industry, but it is virtually impossible to tell the condition of the dial from its picture.
Thank You for reading.
Scott Slootsky owner of W-PRECISION
