WEBVTT - Benjamin Clymer and Jeffery Fowler on Hodinkee 0:00:02.040 --> 0:00:06.000 This is Master's in Business with Barry rid Hoolds on 0:00:06.240 --> 0:00:07.320 Bloomberg Radio. 0:00:08.440 --> 0:00:11.200 This week on the podcast, I have a pair of 0:00:11.320 --> 0:00:16.200 extra special guests. Ben Klember took an buyout offer from 0:00:16.280 --> 0:00:19.439 UBS in two thousand and eight, right in the middle 0:00:19.600 --> 0:00:22.880 of the financial crisis, and said, I know what I'm 0:00:22.880 --> 0:00:26.520 gonna do. I'm gonna launch a site about watches, which 0:00:26.520 --> 0:00:29.640 has been my hobby and see where this goes. And 0:00:30.000 --> 0:00:32.600 that was fifteen years ago and it's turned into one 0:00:32.680 --> 0:00:37.040 hundred million dollar business with incredible investors and just a 0:00:37.240 --> 0:00:41.680 huge brand on the Internet. Jeff Fowler has been CEO 0:00:41.720 --> 0:00:45.240 of the company for just about two years. This really 0:00:45.320 --> 0:00:49.519 is a fascinating discussion. First, if you're interested in watches, 0:00:49.640 --> 0:00:52.680 it's amazing to talk to guys who have known so 0:00:52.840 --> 0:00:55.160 much and are so plugged into what's going on in 0:00:55.160 --> 0:00:58.640 the industry and really are right in the middle of 0:00:59.120 --> 0:01:04.640 what's become a speculative boom in time pieces. But also 0:01:05.480 --> 0:01:10.760 this is a story of starting a small media outlet, 0:01:10.840 --> 0:01:15.600 a small web presence, and recognizing that there's business potential 0:01:15.720 --> 0:01:20.880 here and how to slowly grow that into something that's substantial. 0:01:21.240 --> 0:01:22.959 How do you hire people, how do you go out 0:01:22.959 --> 0:01:26.000 and find investors. When do you do that? When do 0:01:26.040 --> 0:01:28.319 you take this to the next level? When do you 0:01:28.440 --> 0:01:32.080 as founders and CEO say hey, I need somebody who 0:01:32.120 --> 0:01:33.959 can scale this and I'm going to step back and 0:01:34.000 --> 0:01:37.840 become chairperson and bring in a professional CEO to run 0:01:37.880 --> 0:01:40.280 the site. So there are a lot of different ways 0:01:40.280 --> 0:01:42.880 to look at this. I found the conversation to be 0:01:42.920 --> 0:01:45.880 absolutely fascinating. I could have gone for another two hours 0:01:46.560 --> 0:01:51.600 with no further ado my conversation with Hodinky's Ben Klember 0:01:51.800 --> 0:01:55.440 and Jeff Fowler's let's talk a little bit about how 0:01:55.440 --> 0:01:58.080 a blog becomes a business. I know a little bit 0:01:58.120 --> 0:02:02.160 about that. Twosand and eight you launched a blog after 0:02:02.240 --> 0:02:05.120 you leave UBS in the midst of the financial crisis. 0:02:05.200 --> 0:02:07.840 Yeah, first, what were you doing at UBS? So I 0:02:07.960 --> 0:02:10.600 was basically the lowest of the low man on totem poles. 0:02:10.680 --> 0:02:12.600 I was twenty four. I was working at UBS in 0:02:12.639 --> 0:02:14.600 wealth management. And it's funny, actually, before I even get 0:02:14.600 --> 0:02:17.040 into that, coming to Bloomberg is actually my favorite place 0:02:17.080 --> 0:02:19.280 to go because it is the only location that I 0:02:19.400 --> 0:02:22.640 visited pre hoad Inky and post hod Inky. Oh really so, actually, 0:02:22.639 --> 0:02:24.200 when I used to visit here, your systems used to 0:02:24.200 --> 0:02:26.520 pull up the original photograph ever taken of me as 0:02:26.560 --> 0:02:29.200 a guest, and it was me at twenty four years old, 0:02:28.680 --> 0:02:32.120 no beard, dressed head to toe and Joseph A. Banks. Legitimately, 0:02:32.600 --> 0:02:35.000 I'm not dressing that anymore, thankfully, and it was just 0:02:35.040 --> 0:02:37.200 an amazing flashback. Anytime I come here, I've been here 0:02:37.200 --> 0:02:39.800 a few times for other shows, and so this is 0:02:39.840 --> 0:02:41.720 one of the few places really in the world that 0:02:41.760 --> 0:02:44.600 kind of unites my pre hoad inky and present day world. 0:02:44.760 --> 0:02:50.600 That's really interesting. So post Ubs, yes, you're doing this 0:02:50.800 --> 0:02:52.480 just as a hobby, started as an interest. 0:02:52.320 --> 0:02:54.280 Started for fun. So I was a kid. I was 0:02:54.280 --> 0:02:56.320 in wealth management at Ubs, and this was two thousand 0:02:56.320 --> 0:02:59.040 and eight when Leven collapsed and the world effectively imploded, 0:02:59.080 --> 0:03:01.760 certainly for people of my age who had no authority 0:03:01.800 --> 0:03:03.520 at all. I mean, we had no cloud whatsoever in 0:03:03.520 --> 0:03:06.640 a giant company like at Ubs. And they said basically like, look, 0:03:06.880 --> 0:03:08.960 you're probably going to get laid off. Will you take 0:03:08.960 --> 0:03:10.720 a severance package and get out of here? And I said, 0:03:10.760 --> 0:03:12.919 oh no, what hell? Yeah, absolutely, And keep in mind 0:03:12.960 --> 0:03:15.079 I had nothing. Both my parents are public school teachers. 0:03:15.080 --> 0:03:16.720 I mean, I didn't come from a world of luxury 0:03:16.800 --> 0:03:19.000 or finance or anything like this at all from Rochester, 0:03:19.040 --> 0:03:21.560 which is not anywhere near Westchester, you know, a really 0:03:21.600 --> 0:03:24.280 dramatically different world. And I said, you know what, like finance, 0:03:24.360 --> 0:03:26.359 this version of finance is just not for me at all. 0:03:26.880 --> 0:03:29.519 I always fancied myself a writer. My grandfather, who was 0:03:29.600 --> 0:03:31.080 kind of a mentor not kind of. He was a 0:03:31.080 --> 0:03:32.799 mentor to me. He was still alive at the time, 0:03:32.840 --> 0:03:35.760 and he was an entrepreneur. He gave me his Omega Speedmaster, 0:03:35.840 --> 0:03:37.480 which is a really nice watch, when I was sixteen 0:03:37.560 --> 0:03:39.040 years old. Is my only nice watch. 0:03:39.200 --> 0:03:41.760 So wait, you're I'm trying to do the math if 0:03:41.760 --> 0:03:46.040 you were twenty four and eight. So you got this 0:03:46.200 --> 0:03:48.880 watch in two thoy ninety nine. 0:03:49.000 --> 0:03:50.040 Yeah, around there, I would say. 0:03:50.080 --> 0:03:52.240 And he purchased it twenty thirty years before he. 0:03:52.240 --> 0:03:54.640 Actually purchased it. He purchased it in the early nineties. 0:03:54.640 --> 0:03:56.320 It was a later speed Master. He bought it when 0:03:56.360 --> 0:03:58.400 he was in his probably sixties or seventies, so it 0:03:58.400 --> 0:04:00.440 wasn't like something he had throughout his entire lif but 0:04:00.480 --> 0:04:03.360 still it's what I remembered him wearing. And one day 0:04:03.360 --> 0:04:04.960 he just literally slid off his wrist and said, I 0:04:04.960 --> 0:04:08.000 want you to have this, which is unbelievable to me, obviously, 0:04:08.520 --> 0:04:10.680 and that was his daily drug, that was his daily driver. 0:04:10.800 --> 0:04:13.320 That and a gold Rolex Day eight as well, which 0:04:13.360 --> 0:04:16.400 now my father has. And it was just something so 0:04:16.440 --> 0:04:19.360 impactful to me. And he was really my hero. I mean, 0:04:19.360 --> 0:04:21.680 he represented something that that I didn't really see much 0:04:21.720 --> 0:04:24.080 of in Rochester, New York, which was a self made 0:04:24.120 --> 0:04:27.240 you know, truly self made to a material degree. Was 0:04:27.320 --> 0:04:30.800 interested in the world, interested in how things are made, 0:04:30.920 --> 0:04:33.080 nice cars, nice watches, et cetera. And had very little 0:04:33.120 --> 0:04:35.120 to do with the cost of things, but really appreciated 0:04:35.120 --> 0:04:37.159 how things were made. And it was always critical that 0:04:37.240 --> 0:04:39.680 he made me understand why in Omega would be two 0:04:39.680 --> 0:04:42.120 thousand dollars instead of two hundred, or Mercedes would be 0:04:42.160 --> 0:04:43.839 sixty thousand dollars instead of six thousand. 0:04:44.680 --> 0:04:48.440 But really quite interesting. So so you have this cash 0:04:48.480 --> 0:04:49.960 out from UBS. 0:04:49.560 --> 0:04:50.680 If you can call it that. I think it was 0:04:50.720 --> 0:04:52.520 a grand total of around nine thousand dollars, all right 0:04:52.600 --> 0:04:54.040 for me, Hey call it. 0:04:53.960 --> 0:04:56.320 One thousand and eight. That was not nothing. 0:04:56.480 --> 0:04:58.200 Yeah, And look, and I was twenty four, I was 0:04:58.240 --> 0:05:00.200 living with my girlfriend at the time, and so just 0:05:00.279 --> 0:05:02.080 kind of goofing around. So I'm like to be able 0:05:02.080 --> 0:05:03.640 to pay my you know, I think my share of 0:05:03.640 --> 0:05:05.800 the rent each month was around nine hundred dollars, so 0:05:05.839 --> 0:05:06.640 like that paid. 0:05:06.560 --> 0:05:08.640 Hey, but your years were almost the year's worth and. 0:05:08.640 --> 0:05:11.560 Rent exactly right, so allowed me to take my time 0:05:11.560 --> 0:05:14.160 and write with that. With that time, I ended up 0:05:14.200 --> 0:05:16.680 freelancing for the likes of GQ for the Financial Times 0:05:16.720 --> 0:05:19.000 How to Spend It, you know, great really great publications, 0:05:19.279 --> 0:05:24.000 mostly about watches, but other men's lifestyle things, cars, you know, whatever, restaurants. 0:05:24.279 --> 0:05:26.440 Ended up applying to journalism school here in the city 0:05:26.440 --> 0:05:29.200 at Columbia for a master's degree. I went to undergrad 0:05:29.240 --> 0:05:31.880 for finance and computer science, so dramatically different field, and 0:05:31.920 --> 0:05:33.440 I said, look, I'm going to be in media, and 0:05:33.480 --> 0:05:35.160 I wanted to be a true journalist, like a real 0:05:35.320 --> 0:05:38.320 Bloomberg style journalist. I wanted to do it the right way. 0:05:38.360 --> 0:05:40.560 So I applied to Columbia, somehow got in using my 0:05:40.600 --> 0:05:43.920 blog about watches as the foundation of my application, and 0:05:43.960 --> 0:05:46.840 ended two years of a master's degreeyet at Columbia, while 0:05:46.880 --> 0:05:50.040 I continued to blog every day about watches. 0:05:49.960 --> 0:05:52.240 And the site was called to Dinky it was. 0:05:52.400 --> 0:05:54.320 It was called Houdinky from the start Hodinky with a 0:05:54.480 --> 0:05:57.559 y and it means wristwatch in check of all things. 0:05:57.600 --> 0:06:00.160 Everyone asked, I'm actually not check, but I was just 0:06:00.200 --> 0:06:03.520 kind of goofing around and googling Google translating what wristwatch 0:06:03.600 --> 0:06:05.839 was in different languages, and and you might remember. But 0:06:05.960 --> 0:06:08.560 like so in two thousand and eight, Google was the 0:06:08.600 --> 0:06:10.600 hottest thing on earth, and Google was like, really kind 0:06:10.600 --> 0:06:13.240 of it's on its ascent, and the double vowel kind 0:06:13.240 --> 0:06:15.080 of like stuck with me. And another site that launched 0:06:15.080 --> 0:06:16.640 around the same time had a double vowel, and it's 0:06:16.640 --> 0:06:19.960 called Goop, Gwyneth Paltrow's lifestyle site. So the double vowel, 0:06:20.000 --> 0:06:22.839 for some reason, really was popular with Internet domains. 0:06:23.400 --> 0:06:27.240 You can't get you can't get a domain, right, I 0:06:27.320 --> 0:06:31.039 literally wrote down what was the inspiration for using the 0:06:31.160 --> 0:06:34.359 check word for watch? But I know if you go 0:06:34.400 --> 0:06:38.200 to register a company or haven't forbid register a dot com, 0:06:38.680 --> 0:06:41.679 every word, every two letter, three letter four letter combination 0:06:41.760 --> 0:06:44.839 has been taken, every common word in the dictionary. Somebody's 0:06:44.880 --> 0:06:47.680 squatting on. So yet really have to get creative. 0:06:47.760 --> 0:06:49.919 Yeah, so we we. I'm still used to saying we 0:06:49.960 --> 0:06:51.320 as if it was more than me. It was just me. 0:06:51.440 --> 0:06:52.919 But I always used to use the royal weed to 0:06:52.920 --> 0:06:54.760 pretend like we were biggert we are now actually having 0:06:54.760 --> 0:06:56.240 the people here, which they were a huge company you 0:06:56.240 --> 0:06:59.280 wouldn't understand. So but back then, even more than that, 0:06:59.320 --> 0:07:01.800 I was already a of the tenuous relationship tenus it 0:07:01.880 --> 0:07:05.080 best relationship that watches and luxury had with the Internet. 0:07:05.360 --> 0:07:07.599 And so the first people to sell watches on the 0:07:07.600 --> 0:07:09.279 Internet or even list watches on the Internet were what 0:07:09.320 --> 0:07:11.960 we call gray market dealers, guys that had no legal 0:07:12.040 --> 0:07:12.960 right to sell watches. 0:07:13.040 --> 0:07:15.960 So people that we well, I'm guessing eBay was pretty 0:07:15.960 --> 0:07:18.440 big in the early Absolutely still is eBay is the 0:07:18.480 --> 0:07:19.520 largest watch strow on Earth. 0:07:19.640 --> 0:07:22.440 Oh is that true? Absolutely absolutely, much to the chagrin 0:07:22.520 --> 0:07:24.800 of the Swiss, but it is the largest seller of 0:07:24.840 --> 0:07:27.000 watches on Earth. And look, I mean it's just it's 0:07:27.080 --> 0:07:30.160 just reality. But I mean, forget eBay. eBay is a 0:07:30.200 --> 0:07:33.160 real publicly traded you know, has has business practices that 0:07:33.160 --> 0:07:35.520 we all hold in the high regard. Well, you know, 0:07:36.000 --> 0:07:37.920 there are other other sellers. 0:07:37.640 --> 0:07:40.840 Out let's put a little asterisk on that one big circle. 0:07:41.480 --> 0:07:43.320 That's a good one. But the there were a lot 0:07:43.360 --> 0:07:46.920 of other purveyors of watches that really were not super 0:07:47.000 --> 0:07:51.400 super ethical folks, little shady a little bit. And so 0:07:51.520 --> 0:07:54.320 the Swiss and the and the Europeans at large were 0:07:54.360 --> 0:07:57.040 really kind of reticent to to to get involved with 0:07:57.080 --> 0:07:59.520 watches on the Internet at all, and that includes evening 0:07:59.640 --> 0:08:01.560 even a covering them. So when I would go to 0:08:01.560 --> 0:08:05.520 Switzerland and say, hey, Rolex Pa Tech, whoever Omega smaller brands, 0:08:05.680 --> 0:08:08.040 can I photograph your watches from write about them? They say, oh, 0:08:08.080 --> 0:08:10.120 you know, we don't really want coverage on the internet. Truly. 0:08:10.160 --> 0:08:13.400 That's how it was like in the early forward tech exactly, 0:08:13.520 --> 0:08:16.960 very forward thinking. There's a famous line that I've told 0:08:17.080 --> 0:08:18.840 in a few other podcasts and a few other stories 0:08:18.880 --> 0:08:22.120 where a very very prominent i mean one of the 0:08:22.120 --> 0:08:24.480 most prominent CEOs of one of the largest Swiss luxury 0:08:24.480 --> 0:08:26.840 groups in the world told me to my face in 0:08:26.840 --> 0:08:29.280 twenty ten that he thought the internet was for poor people, 0:08:29.320 --> 0:08:31.360 that nobody would ever make a buying decision based on 0:08:31.400 --> 0:08:33.680 anything published on the Internet. And keep in mind, this 0:08:33.720 --> 0:08:35.120 is what I was doing for a living back. 0:08:35.000 --> 0:08:37.120 That's you know, if someone would have said that in 0:08:37.240 --> 0:08:40.760 nineteen ninety nineteen ninety five, I would have said, all right, 0:08:40.800 --> 0:08:43.080 their a little backwards looking, but by twenty ten. 0:08:43.280 --> 0:08:45.079 Yes, Amazon is immense. 0:08:45.280 --> 0:08:48.960 All these companies had migrated. Jeff, what were you doing 0:08:49.120 --> 0:08:50.080 in twenty ten? 0:08:50.280 --> 0:08:52.480 I was working on Louis Vuitton at the time, and 0:08:53.440 --> 0:08:54.640 it was actually Jeff who said it to me. 0:08:54.760 --> 0:08:59.480 Yeah, so, Lesbie, they have a pretty robust online presence. 0:09:00.040 --> 0:09:02.320 Yeah, I mean at that time it was likely the 0:09:02.400 --> 0:09:05.640 case that Louis Euton's dot com store, if you want 0:09:05.640 --> 0:09:09.040 to call their online presence, was likely the biggest store 0:09:09.080 --> 0:09:11.360 in any of their regions globally, certainly in the US. 0:09:11.400 --> 0:09:14.480 Louisviton dot com for the US region was well on 0:09:14.520 --> 0:09:17.319 its way to becoming the biggest site for any sales 0:09:17.320 --> 0:09:20.640 for Louis Vuitton. So yeah, was well established at that point. 0:09:20.360 --> 0:09:23.400 But Ben's right, I mean even across the broader luxury 0:09:23.400 --> 0:09:26.480 categories of fashion shoes. I mean, luxury was late to 0:09:26.520 --> 0:09:28.200 the game, saw it as more of a branding and 0:09:28.240 --> 0:09:31.240 marketing activity, and the watch industry in particular was very, 0:09:31.280 --> 0:09:34.960 very late to I think understand the true impact and potential. 0:09:34.640 --> 0:09:37.400 Of And when did you first first become aware of 0:09:37.400 --> 0:09:38.760 this little blog called hode. 0:09:39.000 --> 0:09:41.000 Yeah. I was at LVMH for a number of years, 0:09:41.040 --> 0:09:43.080 mostly with Louis Vuton for the first few years and 0:09:43.120 --> 0:09:46.559 Louis Euton has a watch business and division, and then 0:09:46.600 --> 0:09:49.000 within lvmhor I moved to Taghoyr, which is a pure 0:09:49.280 --> 0:09:52.600 watch business within the broader luxury group. It was really 0:09:52.679 --> 0:09:55.280 kind of in the Taghoyr timeline for me career wise 0:09:55.320 --> 0:09:58.280 that it became aware of Ben and of Hoodinky, And 0:09:58.360 --> 0:10:00.840 as he stated earlier, in my mind, Houdinky was this 0:10:01.080 --> 0:10:04.520 huge operation. It was, you know, dozens of writers and 0:10:04.559 --> 0:10:07.679 journalists simply because the influence that they already had at 0:10:07.679 --> 0:10:11.560 that point, this is twenty twelve twenty thirteen, was enormous 0:10:11.600 --> 0:10:14.560 in the industry. There would always be someone from Hoodinky 0:10:14.760 --> 0:10:16.360 at a precedent or press junket. 0:10:17.000 --> 0:10:17.200 You know. 0:10:17.280 --> 0:10:20.400 The site was getting a huge amount of appeal and 0:10:20.679 --> 0:10:23.680 building a community. So we were well aware of their impact. 0:10:24.040 --> 0:10:26.440 But I hadn't met Ben yet. I was heading up 0:10:26.480 --> 0:10:28.640 retail for Tag Hoyer for North America, so I was 0:10:28.679 --> 0:10:31.480 sort of traveling around from market to market, store to store. 0:10:32.280 --> 0:10:34.720 But yeah, I was very aware of Hudinky's impact. 0:10:34.880 --> 0:10:36.480 So I'm going to jump to the end of the 0:10:36.520 --> 0:10:39.720 story and then we'll backfill what took place between eight 0:10:40.160 --> 0:10:44.640 and twenty twenty two. You join as CEO last year. 0:10:45.640 --> 0:10:48.320 How did that transition take place and why were you 0:10:48.400 --> 0:10:51.240 excited about stepping into the chairman's role. 0:10:51.440 --> 0:10:54.079 So for me, Hoodinky has been my life's work truly. 0:10:54.120 --> 0:10:55.360 I mean, I have a child now, but I kind 0:10:55.360 --> 0:10:57.760 of think of it as my firstborn. And you know, 0:10:58.000 --> 0:11:00.360 like any child, you know, things tend to grow up 0:11:00.360 --> 0:11:02.040 and mature. And I think, you know, if there's one 0:11:02.080 --> 0:11:03.959 thing i can say about myself, it's that I'm acutely 0:11:03.960 --> 0:11:06.400 aware of my strengths and weaknesses. And as my strengths 0:11:06.440 --> 0:11:08.280 are that I've got the vision, the idea. I think. 0:11:08.320 --> 0:11:10.000 I think I'm a solid writer. I've got, you know, 0:11:10.080 --> 0:11:13.000 the creative mind to to build something that other people 0:11:13.000 --> 0:11:16.080 wouldn't see. If I may say, where I'm not super strong, 0:11:16.120 --> 0:11:19.280 honestly is running a business at scale constitution is tough, 0:11:19.360 --> 0:11:21.120 sure is to come to find out, you know. And 0:11:21.160 --> 0:11:23.360 so you know, when we closed our Series B in 0:11:23.480 --> 0:11:26.520 twenty twenty, which as you mentioned, include lvmh in in 0:11:26.559 --> 0:11:29.400 a minority share, there's no there's no majority holder. Just 0:11:29.400 --> 0:11:32.880 to be clear, TCG, Tom Brady, Tony Fidel, John Mayer. 0:11:32.880 --> 0:11:34.800 I mean, like all these mean, that's a crazy list. 0:11:34.840 --> 0:11:37.560 That's a crazy people don't know who Tony Fiddell is. 0:11:38.040 --> 0:11:41.040 He is essentially the guy who created the iPod and 0:11:41.080 --> 0:11:43.560 then said I need to do something out and then 0:11:43.640 --> 0:11:46.800 goes out and creates nests. Yes exactly, I mean talk about. 0:11:46.760 --> 0:11:49.640 A design you know, legacy, amazing. 0:11:49.240 --> 0:11:51.640 He's he's a legend, and he's of all the people 0:11:51.920 --> 0:11:54.760 in my in professional life that is mentor, he would 0:11:54.760 --> 0:11:56.800 be the one. And actually it was he who decided, 0:11:57.000 --> 0:11:59.400 or he who influenced me not to sell the business. 0:11:59.400 --> 0:12:00.880 I had the opportunit need to sell the business in 0:12:00.920 --> 0:12:02.800 twenty fourteen, and he said, do not sell this thing. 0:12:02.880 --> 0:12:05.280 Let me help you raise money. So he actually invested 0:12:05.280 --> 0:12:05.960 as early as to us. 0:12:06.240 --> 0:12:10.640 And I know from having seen him on talking watches. Yeah, exactly, 0:12:11.160 --> 0:12:14.320 he's been a watch geek forever because the you know, 0:12:14.360 --> 0:12:17.800 it's funny, we briefly touched upon what your grandfather said, 0:12:18.160 --> 0:12:23.720 but the elements of design and precision craftsmanship come together 0:12:23.800 --> 0:12:27.720 and watch in a way very few things do. Perhaps 0:12:27.720 --> 0:12:29.520 the iPod and nest are good example. 0:12:29.720 --> 0:12:32.000 That's exactly that, and so so Tony Fidel. A guy 0:12:32.040 --> 0:12:34.920 named Kevin Rose who sorted dig and is now in NFTs. 0:12:35.000 --> 0:12:36.800 He was actually he stepped in and invested as well, 0:12:36.840 --> 0:12:39.360 and was actually our CEO for a while. Tony Conrad, 0:12:39.400 --> 0:12:41.800 who's big and trueventures he did Peloton and Blue Bottles 0:12:41.960 --> 0:12:43.959 really great, you know Silicon Valley names that were all 0:12:43.960 --> 0:12:46.400 friends and we all kind of connected. They all kind 0:12:46.400 --> 0:12:48.440 of helped me shepherd in this new version of what 0:12:48.480 --> 0:12:51.000 Hodingki could be, which was that of a retailer and 0:12:51.000 --> 0:12:54.280 that of somebody who had this amazing influence. Editorially speaking, 0:12:54.280 --> 0:12:56.240 we had done limited editions where we designed them. I'm 0:12:56.240 --> 0:12:58.440 actually wearing one right now. Let's say this is an 0:12:58.440 --> 0:13:01.240 IWC that we did, sure, so you know, this is 0:13:01.240 --> 0:13:03.240 a seven thousand dollars watch. We did five hundred sold 0:13:03.280 --> 0:13:05.679 out and I think four minutes. Wow. So you know 0:13:05.720 --> 0:13:08.240 it was it was with their help and their product 0:13:08.240 --> 0:13:10.080 that we said, hey, this could be something much bigger 0:13:10.120 --> 0:13:12.360 than I don't want to say just an editorial platform, 0:13:12.559 --> 0:13:15.040 but we can do real content to commerce. And that 0:13:15.200 --> 0:13:16.920 was really not a model that existed anywhere. 0:13:16.920 --> 0:13:19.040 So let's talk about that. I want to loop Jeff 0:13:19.040 --> 0:13:21.680 into this part of the conversation. So you start out 0:13:21.679 --> 0:13:28.720 as essentially a non professional media outlet, evolve into a 0:13:28.800 --> 0:13:32.800 media outlet, and then eventually add e commerce when you 0:13:32.840 --> 0:13:35.600 think about Hodinky today, and I'll direct this to Jeff 0:13:35.840 --> 0:13:39.240 who joined in twenty twenty two, is it media first? 0:13:39.280 --> 0:13:41.640 Is it e commerce? Or is there no bright line 0:13:41.640 --> 0:13:42.079 between the. 0:13:42.160 --> 0:13:44.520 Yeah, you know, I get that question often, and in 0:13:44.559 --> 0:13:48.520 fact I get that question often even from new joiners 0:13:48.720 --> 0:13:51.720 to Hoodinky people that have come aboard. Perhaps it's that 0:13:51.760 --> 0:13:53.760 we've hired them into the commercial side of the business. 0:13:53.800 --> 0:13:56.080 Perhaps we've hired them into the editorial side of the business. 0:13:56.520 --> 0:13:58.560 And it's not long before they ask, well, which one 0:13:58.600 --> 0:13:59.160 are we are? 0:13:59.240 --> 0:13:59.280 We? 0:13:59.559 --> 0:14:02.400 Are we an editorial sort of content business? Are we 0:14:02.480 --> 0:14:05.480 a commercial business that sells things? And I sort of 0:14:05.480 --> 0:14:07.360 reject the premise that it has to be an or 0:14:07.679 --> 0:14:09.520 rather than an end. But I think it's the end 0:14:09.679 --> 0:14:12.240 aspect that really makes us unique, that really sets us 0:14:12.240 --> 0:14:15.120 apart as a pioneer. And I'm going to quote actually 0:14:15.120 --> 0:14:18.880 someone totally not connected to our business, but recently at 0:14:18.880 --> 0:14:22.480 a conference for CEOs tech executives, the global president of 0:14:22.480 --> 0:14:25.600 Shopify was speaking and was on stage and behind him 0:14:25.600 --> 0:14:28.400 in his slideshow, he presented the logo of Hodinky, and 0:14:28.440 --> 0:14:30.120 a friend of ours was in the audience. It was 0:14:30.200 --> 0:14:32.000 quick on the trigger and pulled up his phone and 0:14:32.280 --> 0:14:36.600 recorded you know this otherwise private conversation happening with CEOs, 0:14:36.640 --> 0:14:39.240 and the gentleman from Shofai said, does anyone know who 0:14:39.320 --> 0:14:40.160 Hodinky is? 0:14:40.320 --> 0:14:42.160 And what year was this? This was last year. 0:14:42.160 --> 0:14:44.120 I remember we're talking maybe six months ago. They don't 0:14:44.160 --> 0:14:46.040 know who Hoadinky is. A bunch of hands I presume 0:14:46.120 --> 0:14:48.000 got you know, put in the air because we were 0:14:48.040 --> 0:14:50.520 just listening to the audio. Says for those who aren't aware, 0:14:50.560 --> 0:14:52.080 if you want to watch, talk to me later. And 0:14:52.080 --> 0:14:54.520 then he proceeded to say, Hodinky is the greatest watch 0:14:54.640 --> 0:14:57.760 retailer on the planet. Here's why, And he said they 0:14:57.760 --> 0:15:00.920 spent the first better part of ten years just writing 0:15:00.920 --> 0:15:04.960 about watches, just pursuing the knowledge of watches, furthering the 0:15:05.000 --> 0:15:08.240 knowledge of watches, building a huge community, and then and 0:15:08.320 --> 0:15:11.120 only then did they start to actually sell things, at 0:15:11.120 --> 0:15:13.360 which point there was a captive audience of people ready 0:15:13.400 --> 0:15:15.640 to convert, which you know, at the end of the 0:15:15.680 --> 0:15:17.880 day is really important if you're running an e commerce business, 0:15:17.960 --> 0:15:20.120 you know, conversion is the key to all of that. 0:15:20.400 --> 0:15:23.000 And I think, you know, we and again we get 0:15:23.040 --> 0:15:25.120 asked this often is like, you know, are you editorial 0:15:25.160 --> 0:15:28.320 or commercial? Isn't there a conflict. Isn't there some sort 0:15:28.320 --> 0:15:31.680 of like mixed sort of motives there, And we reject 0:15:31.720 --> 0:15:34.000 the premise. Again, we simply say, we write about things 0:15:34.000 --> 0:15:35.680 that we love, we sell things that we love, and 0:15:35.720 --> 0:15:38.080 in some ways this there's an intellectual honesty to that. 0:15:38.160 --> 0:15:41.360 You know, there's there's editorial choices being made at every stage, 0:15:41.400 --> 0:15:43.160 whether it's on the content side, whether it's on the 0:15:43.160 --> 0:15:45.880 commercial side, and it just so happens that a content 0:15:45.920 --> 0:15:49.760 to commerce model, if done effectively, is an incredibly efficient model. 0:15:50.160 --> 0:15:51.200 A little secret. 0:15:51.280 --> 0:15:53.760 We don't sort of always say this, but something that 0:15:53.800 --> 0:15:56.120 we love to brag about is there wasn't until twenty 0:15:56.120 --> 0:16:00.000 twenty one that Hodinki spent its first dollar on marketing, right, 0:16:00.160 --> 0:16:01.760 A lot of businesses have to spend a ton of 0:16:01.800 --> 0:16:04.200 their revenue on marketing in order to get that next 0:16:04.240 --> 0:16:07.720 customer in the door. Really is the editorial side of Hootinky, 0:16:07.760 --> 0:16:10.800 That really is what gets people interested, keeps them interested, 0:16:10.880 --> 0:16:13.600 keeps them engaged. For many people, it's their daily read 0:16:14.000 --> 0:16:17.000 on their morning commuter, their afternoon commute, you know, And 0:16:17.480 --> 0:16:19.240 that's really the secret, the secret sauce. 0:16:19.320 --> 0:16:20.920 Yeah, and just to put just quickly, to put a 0:16:20.920 --> 0:16:23.040 fine point on that, just add further context. So Jeff 0:16:23.080 --> 0:16:25.080 is exactly right. We hadn't spent a dollar marketing, and 0:16:25.120 --> 0:16:27.000 literally not a dollar on marketing until April of twenty 0:16:27.040 --> 0:16:29.240 twenty one when we heard it for CMO. We were 0:16:29.240 --> 0:16:32.080 doing about thirty million dollars a year in revenue at 0:16:32.080 --> 0:16:34.240 that point. So we've gotten from zero to thirty million 0:16:34.280 --> 0:16:36.320 dollars a year roughly, you know, give or take without 0:16:36.320 --> 0:16:39.400 a dollar spent on acquisition costs. Wow, that's impressive. 0:16:39.400 --> 0:16:42.160 So since you mentioned the media focus on what you 0:16:42.240 --> 0:16:46.560 really love, let's talk about what you guys write about. 0:16:46.880 --> 0:16:50.920 It's often about the history and the narrative surrounding a 0:16:50.920 --> 0:16:55.440 specific watch, the brand, the background why a watch is important, 0:16:55.880 --> 0:16:58.480 even if you don't like it, here's why it's significant. 0:16:58.720 --> 0:16:59.280 There's a lot. 0:16:59.640 --> 0:17:01.440 I mean, obviously I'm a fan for a long time, 0:17:01.480 --> 0:17:07.160 but discussing the in depth background of each watch. When 0:17:07.200 --> 0:17:10.439 you started doing that, yeah, I mean other than a 0:17:10.520 --> 0:17:14.720 p industry professional red a trade publication, nobody was doing 0:17:14.800 --> 0:17:15.800 anything like that online. 0:17:15.840 --> 0:17:18.320 Yeah, that's exactly right. And I think if there's one 0:17:18.320 --> 0:17:20.320 thing that I'd say we got right early, which was 0:17:20.359 --> 0:17:23.280 this the idea of taking this thing that really could 0:17:23.320 --> 0:17:26.159 be perceived as pretentious or complicated or certainly expensive, you 0:17:26.160 --> 0:17:28.359 can't deny that, and explaining it in a way that 0:17:28.480 --> 0:17:31.520 is incredibly digestible for the average guy like you or 0:17:31.600 --> 0:17:33.800 me or a Jeff, and also doing it online in 0:17:33.840 --> 0:17:37.320 a broadcast mechanism. There were some people discussing the finer 0:17:37.320 --> 0:17:39.479 points of high and watch making inforums, but you had 0:17:39.520 --> 0:17:42.160 to register the comments, I moderated. If you weren't part 0:17:42.160 --> 0:17:43.800 of the gang, you basically had no cloud at all. 0:17:44.000 --> 0:17:46.040 And I said, that just doesn't feel democratic at all, 0:17:46.080 --> 0:17:48.000 Like I love this stuff in such a sincere way. 0:17:48.960 --> 0:17:51.199 I want to basically share what I'm learning to as 0:17:51.200 --> 0:17:53.199 many people as possible, and then people can read it 0:17:53.280 --> 0:17:56.000 or not, they can comment or not. That's okay, and 0:17:56.040 --> 0:17:58.000 I think that is really what made us different from 0:17:58.000 --> 0:17:59.600 everyone else. And we did it in a way that 0:17:59.680 --> 0:18:02.800 was style. And something that I've always really focused on 0:18:02.880 --> 0:18:05.280 is ensuring that the presentation of our of our media 0:18:05.400 --> 0:18:07.960 is really beautiful. And so the first dollars I ever 0:18:08.000 --> 0:18:12.200 spent at Hodinky were to actually have double engraved business cards, 0:18:12.359 --> 0:18:15.760 which literally cost me thousands of dollars. We were exactly 0:18:15.840 --> 0:18:17.000 you know, back in the day when business you. 0:18:17.040 --> 0:18:19.800 Got that nice nine thousand dollar ubs exactly. 0:18:19.800 --> 0:18:22.320 I've probably spent a third of it on business cards, truly, 0:18:22.960 --> 0:18:25.159 But this idea of like presenting something that was just 0:18:25.280 --> 0:18:27.399 so much more thoughtful than anyone else out there. And 0:18:27.440 --> 0:18:28.879 yes we were a blog, and yes we had a 0:18:28.880 --> 0:18:31.840 silly name, and yes we were online, but I cared 0:18:31.880 --> 0:18:34.040 in such a way that was so different than everybody else. 0:18:34.080 --> 0:18:36.000 And a lot of the journalists, and certainly not here 0:18:36.000 --> 0:18:38.199 at Bloomberg, but elsewhere in the world, a lot of 0:18:38.240 --> 0:18:40.639 journalists in the luxury space are there for the good wine, 0:18:41.359 --> 0:18:44.919 the pretty girls or guys, the free travel sometimes on 0:18:44.920 --> 0:18:47.639 these junk kids, and these amazing experiences. And I get that, like, 0:18:47.680 --> 0:18:49.720 I'm not going to knock people that are there for that. 0:18:49.920 --> 0:18:51.600 I wasn't. I didn't know that existed. I wasn't there 0:18:51.600 --> 0:18:53.400 for any of that. I was there for the product 0:18:53.640 --> 0:18:55.680 and there to share the product with as many people 0:18:55.680 --> 0:18:56.119 as well. 0:18:56.160 --> 0:19:01.480 And full disclosure, Bloomberg republishes ho dinky columns on occasion 0:19:01.520 --> 0:19:04.560 it goes incas Yes, in the Wealth or Pursuits section 0:19:04.600 --> 0:19:07.560 of Bloomberg. I didn't mention that earlier, but I want 0:19:07.560 --> 0:19:10.960 everyone to understand you and I have never met before 0:19:11.000 --> 0:19:14.040 the strictly in armslong conversation, but there is a relationship 0:19:14.040 --> 0:19:16.960 between Bloomberg and Hodinky. But let me go back to 0:19:17.119 --> 0:19:20.480 spending three thousand dollars on business cards on a zero 0:19:20.920 --> 0:19:24.760 like of course, law, when did it dawn on you 0:19:24.840 --> 0:19:28.919 that hey, this is could be a business and maybe 0:19:29.600 --> 0:19:30.520 generate a profit. 0:19:30.640 --> 0:19:33.199 Yeah, so, I mean early on we had advertisers, and 0:19:33.240 --> 0:19:35.520 back then, I mean the cost of running hoodinky was 0:19:35.520 --> 0:19:38.920 my time, which was effectively free, and then hosting fees 0:19:38.960 --> 0:19:41.040 on squarespace and elsewhere. So we'll say, what we're using 0:19:41.040 --> 0:19:43.960 for software was so tip it or Tumbler for the 0:19:44.000 --> 0:19:46.159 first six months, and then Space and Squarespace, and I 0:19:46.160 --> 0:19:48.080 love those guys. They were really instrumental to the growth 0:19:48.119 --> 0:19:50.800 of Hordinky allowed me to design my own website in 0:19:50.840 --> 0:19:53.040 two thousand and nine till probably twenty twelve or thirteen 0:19:53.040 --> 0:19:56.040 when we got a professional upgrade and really like without 0:19:56.040 --> 0:19:58.480 them and the interface that we put forward and everybody 0:19:58.520 --> 0:20:00.440 was using WordPress and other you know other a really 0:20:00.600 --> 0:20:03.960 frankly more rudimentary at the time products and Squarespace. Squarespace 0:20:04.040 --> 0:20:06.040 was incredible, I mean really allowed. It was almost like 0:20:06.080 --> 0:20:08.000 Shopify in a way, like really open up a whole 0:20:08.000 --> 0:20:09.680 new world to me to to preduce something that was 0:20:09.720 --> 0:20:10.320 really beautiful. 0:20:10.359 --> 0:20:13.440 What were you using before square space tumbler? All right, 0:20:13.480 --> 0:20:16.520 so let me explain how old I am sure when 0:20:16.600 --> 0:20:20.800 I launched my blog it was on GeoCities, which means 0:20:21.000 --> 0:20:25.520 that you had to do HTML coding. You learn and 0:20:25.600 --> 0:20:31.199 when six apart came out with uh, I'm sorry, is 0:20:31.240 --> 0:20:35.720 it movable type came out with trying to remember the name. 0:20:35.560 --> 0:20:37.280 Of it, I can't even remember anymore. Uh. 0:20:37.359 --> 0:20:40.239 Six apart was a movable type where it was old 0:20:40.240 --> 0:20:43.639 wizzywig where you didn't have to code indent or pictures 0:20:43.760 --> 0:20:46.600 or wait, I could just drag a picture there. This 0:20:46.760 --> 0:20:47.560 is astonishing. 0:20:47.680 --> 0:20:47.960 Yeah. 0:20:48.000 --> 0:20:50.080 So you went from an hour of writing in two 0:20:50.080 --> 0:20:52.600 hours of coding to an hour of writing and five 0:20:52.640 --> 0:20:55.480 minutes of formatting it was that was three Yeah, that 0:20:55.600 --> 0:20:58.480 was a game changer. So when you go from four 0:20:58.560 --> 0:21:01.240 space to whatever was next, what we're using is. 0:21:01.240 --> 0:21:04.840 The So we were in squarespace until probably twenty we 0:21:04.880 --> 0:21:08.840 did a super custom version of scareespace and just on background, 0:21:08.920 --> 0:21:11.080 I was a coder like I in high. 0:21:10.920 --> 0:21:13.440 School graduated, I said, you were college finance. 0:21:13.440 --> 0:21:15.119 So I was doing I was banging out coat for 0:21:15.400 --> 0:21:17.200 a good chunk of time there in college and before 0:21:17.240 --> 0:21:19.120 I built my first website when I was probably fourteen, 0:21:20.280 --> 0:21:22.040 so you know, it was something that that I really 0:21:22.040 --> 0:21:23.920 took a lot of pride in. And then in twenty 0:21:24.160 --> 0:21:27.560 thirteen fourteen, an agency that that actually Jeff knows what 0:21:27.640 --> 0:21:31.720 called Wondersauced a great name, I know, they approached us 0:21:31.760 --> 0:21:33.560 and said, hey, we love what you're doing. Your content 0:21:33.640 --> 0:21:35.840 is unreal, like, can we help redesign your site? And 0:21:35.840 --> 0:21:37.560 I was like, I don't have any money, but sure, 0:21:37.600 --> 0:21:41.320 you know, And it was this probably twenty twelve. 0:21:41.440 --> 0:21:44.399 Okay, at that point in the nine thousand zeverance was gone. 0:21:44.359 --> 0:21:46.760 Right, so four years later it was long but yeah, 0:21:46.760 --> 0:21:49.000 so taking a step back. So we we hadn't been 0:21:49.040 --> 0:21:51.879 making money with advertising, and advertisers came quickly because we 0:21:51.920 --> 0:21:53.440 had represented we represented. 0:21:53.040 --> 0:21:54.399 Anybody else was in that space. 0:21:54.760 --> 0:21:56.800 You had it to yourself all online. And on top 0:21:56.840 --> 0:21:58.840 of that, our audience was wrapped. I mean, audience was 0:21:58.880 --> 0:22:00.959 obsessed with what we were doing. The young and they 0:22:00.960 --> 0:22:03.119 were They might not be wealthy now, but they probably 0:22:03.280 --> 0:22:05.479 they probably were going to be, you know, And so 0:22:05.520 --> 0:22:07.760 we had average Our first big advertiser was Automarpi Gay 0:22:07.960 --> 0:22:10.280 We had Ptec as a no kid. We had Rolex 0:22:10.320 --> 0:22:12.560 as an advertiser, frankly in a different way than we 0:22:12.600 --> 0:22:15.840 do now. Even it was really special because we weren't 0:22:15.840 --> 0:22:18.080 selling anything. We were just there to promote the industry. 0:22:18.400 --> 0:22:20.880 And what change for me was after a few years 0:22:20.920 --> 0:22:22.960 of making a good living and I own the whole thing, 0:22:23.000 --> 0:22:24.480 so it was like a nice little living for me. 0:22:24.880 --> 0:22:27.399 I said, hey, like, I'm getting these emails that person 0:22:27.560 --> 0:22:30.080 X or woman why is buying this protect filip or 0:22:30.160 --> 0:22:32.720 Rolex whatever because of the content we're creating And here's 0:22:32.720 --> 0:22:34.520 the proof, Like, here's an email, And I would take 0:22:34.560 --> 0:22:36.400 that to brand X and I would say, hey, isn't 0:22:36.400 --> 0:22:38.119 this cool? Do you guys want to advertise more? And 0:22:38.160 --> 0:22:39.520 they say, oh, no, we're good, But like you want 0:22:39.520 --> 0:22:41.280 to come to per Se for dinner? And I was like, 0:22:41.359 --> 0:22:43.160 per Se is lovely, but like you know, that doesn't 0:22:43.200 --> 0:22:45.080 that doesn't pay for my rent, It doesn't allow me 0:22:45.119 --> 0:22:47.439 to grow this business. And I said, man, our audience 0:22:47.520 --> 0:22:49.879 is really special. And we started doing these surveys, internal 0:22:49.920 --> 0:22:52.280 surveys where hey, what do you want from Hoodinki? The 0:22:52.400 --> 0:22:54.560 number one response every single time to this day is 0:22:54.560 --> 0:22:56.680 for Hoodinki to sell things. Because they trust us. 0:22:56.720 --> 0:22:59.760 Really very interesting. I'm intrigued by how you guys have 0:22:59.800 --> 0:23:03.240 grown own. I'm familiar with a few parallel stories, but 0:23:04.119 --> 0:23:06.000 I don't know of anybody that's taken it to the 0:23:06.040 --> 0:23:07.560 level that that Hodinky has. 0:23:07.600 --> 0:23:08.360 I appreciate that. 0:23:08.480 --> 0:23:11.520 Ben Kleimber is the founder of odinky, one of the 0:23:11.520 --> 0:23:15.959 world's most fascinating and well read watch sites. Jeff Fowler 0:23:16.119 --> 0:23:19.920 is the company CEO. A couple of years ago they 0:23:20.000 --> 0:23:24.359 launched whodinky shop is what its current name is. I 0:23:24.400 --> 0:23:26.359 don't know if it was called something else. 0:23:26.480 --> 0:23:28.800 It's Hodinky. I mean the shop was, you know, it 0:23:28.880 --> 0:23:31.119 was basically, you know, to get into breast haacks. It 0:23:31.160 --> 0:23:34.200 was a subdomain powered by Shopify, so we did shop 0:23:34.200 --> 0:23:35.600 at hoodinky dot com. But it's hodinky. 0:23:35.640 --> 0:23:37.480 It's all one company, all right, and it now does 0:23:37.560 --> 0:23:40.359 sells over one hundred million dollars worth of watches, which 0:23:40.400 --> 0:23:43.480 is not too shabby. So so let's talk a little 0:23:43.480 --> 0:23:47.960 bit about the wacky world of watch retailing, starting with 0:23:48.600 --> 0:23:51.800 why can't I walk into a Rolex shop or a 0:23:51.880 --> 0:23:56.240 bushera Tourneau or any retailer and say, Hey, that Daytona 0:23:56.280 --> 0:23:59.560 is pretty nice, and that Batman Jubilee bracelet. Let me 0:23:59.560 --> 0:24:01.399 take those too. Why can't we do that? 0:24:01.480 --> 0:24:03.880 I mean, the simple answer is just supply and demand. 0:24:04.440 --> 0:24:07.000 You know, there's well more demand than there is supply 0:24:07.040 --> 0:24:10.879 of these products brand new at retail. You know, it's 0:24:10.960 --> 0:24:15.400 estimated that Rolex produces around a million watches something like that. Yeah, 0:24:15.720 --> 0:24:17.560 give it, give or take a million watches a year. 0:24:18.200 --> 0:24:20.400 No one knows the real answer for exactly how many 0:24:20.440 --> 0:24:23.040 they could sell if they had, you know, the amount 0:24:23.080 --> 0:24:24.639 of supply to meet demand. But it's got to be 0:24:24.680 --> 0:24:29.320 in the millions, so you naturally get this issue of constraint. 0:24:29.000 --> 0:24:31.960 I don't believe it's a managed constraint. I don't think 0:24:31.960 --> 0:24:34.560 it's one where they're like intentionally trying to come some 0:24:34.840 --> 0:24:38.560 million units under the demand. But of course, like you know, 0:24:38.640 --> 0:24:40.800 only Rolexs would be able to answer that question at 0:24:40.800 --> 0:24:43.440 the end of the day. Scaling up in this industry 0:24:43.520 --> 0:24:47.120 is not terribly easy. I mean, you know, they're roll handmade, 0:24:47.160 --> 0:24:50.840 They're very intricate. Some of the nicer watches are five hundred, 0:24:50.920 --> 0:24:54.399 seven hundred nine hundred teeny tiny little pieces. Yeah, and 0:24:54.560 --> 0:24:57.240 I often say that, you know, leading aside of the 0:24:57.280 --> 0:24:59.840 brand on the dial of the watch, the most important 0:24:59.840 --> 0:25:02.560 thing on the dial of a Swiss mechanic watches these 0:25:02.600 --> 0:25:05.760 two tiny words Swiss made usually around the six o'clock marker. 0:25:06.119 --> 0:25:07.680 And for that to be the case, it's got to 0:25:07.680 --> 0:25:11.399 be totally manufactured, assembled, quality controlled. Every step of the 0:25:11.480 --> 0:25:13.960 process is to take place in Switzerland. And I'm sure 0:25:14.000 --> 0:25:16.120 you visited Switzerland then, and I have been there many times. 0:25:16.240 --> 0:25:17.560 I have, it's on my list. 0:25:17.640 --> 0:25:20.399 It is a teeny tiny country, right, It's like I 0:25:20.520 --> 0:25:22.520 always say, for most parts of Switzerland, if you just 0:25:22.600 --> 0:25:24.000 pick up your eyes and look at their eyes, and 0:25:24.040 --> 0:25:25.080 you're probably looking. 0:25:24.920 --> 0:25:25.719 At another country. 0:25:26.160 --> 0:25:26.240 Now. 0:25:26.400 --> 0:25:28.520 You know, the tiny villages in the mountains, you know 0:25:28.640 --> 0:25:33.040 the historical you know, cradle of watchmaking is all there, 0:25:33.520 --> 0:25:35.119 and a lot of people in those parts of the 0:25:35.200 --> 0:25:38.040 country are affiliated to the watchmaking industry. But they're making 0:25:38.119 --> 0:25:41.240 one tiny subcomponent, teeny tiny part, and it all comes 0:25:41.280 --> 0:25:44.280 together in one glorious supply chain that ultimately becomes these watches. 0:25:44.320 --> 0:25:46.240 But it isn't as though you can just scale that. 0:25:46.320 --> 0:25:49.240 Up very quiet and to put some flesh on the bones. 0:25:49.640 --> 0:25:53.440 So if Rolux is doing a million million, two Paddock 0:25:53.560 --> 0:25:56.639 is doing sixty thousand, Yeah about that, And Lango is 0:25:56.720 --> 0:25:59.439 doing five thousand, Yeah, five six seven in that right, 0:25:59.480 --> 0:26:03.240 I mean are just insane numbers. Yes, it's seven thousand 0:26:03.280 --> 0:26:05.920 of anything is Yeah, you know that. That's how many 0:26:06.320 --> 0:26:10.360 must and convertibles sell. Yeah, that's and good good luck 0:26:10.400 --> 0:26:12.760 get it. They cost about the same. You could walk 0:26:12.880 --> 0:26:15.760 into a Ford dealer in order must end convertible. You 0:26:15.920 --> 0:26:19.760 can't walk into a language now. To be fair, a 0:26:19.840 --> 0:26:22.919 lot of these places they're like perpetual calendars that are 0:26:22.920 --> 0:26:26.360 a buck fifty. You could probably go in and get one, yeah, 0:26:26.520 --> 0:26:28.879 if you, if they like you, maybe maybe, And I 0:26:29.119 --> 0:26:31.960 like those seem to be more available than the Yeah. 0:26:31.800 --> 0:26:33.280 Look I think that the average I mean just to 0:26:33.320 --> 0:26:35.080 get you know, the Rolex question is one we get 0:26:35.080 --> 0:26:36.880 a lot obviously because every guy in the street. Look, 0:26:36.880 --> 0:26:39.600 I love Rolex, I own several, but everybody when you. 0:26:39.640 --> 0:26:42.480 Were a UBS, did you notice that, like every kind 0:26:42.560 --> 0:26:47.000 of shady stockbroker had a Submarner. Yes, I mean I 0:26:47.720 --> 0:26:50.480 know everybody loves that. I have a problem with that 0:26:50.640 --> 0:26:54.720 watch because I just associate it with you know, junk 0:26:54.800 --> 0:26:55.920 stocks and heart selling. 0:26:56.040 --> 0:26:58.160 Yeah, I get that, and like the whole like used 0:26:58.160 --> 0:27:00.920 car salesman guy where it's like that has that has 0:27:01.080 --> 0:27:03.880 dissipated quite a bit, and now people want Rolexes. 0:27:03.920 --> 0:27:05.639 You know, when I was, well, they're not the Rolex, 0:27:05.800 --> 0:27:08.040 just the sub mariners got it. Like the senior guys 0:27:08.080 --> 0:27:11.480 had gmts and Daytona's, but the junior guys all were 0:27:11.520 --> 0:27:14.640 wearing subs and people kind of looked a stancy. 0:27:14.840 --> 0:27:16.000 He used to be able to go in and get 0:27:16.040 --> 0:27:18.800 it whenever you said, yeah, exactly. And the world has 0:27:18.880 --> 0:27:20.720 just changed. And look, I would never take or we 0:27:20.760 --> 0:27:22.600 should not take all the credit. But like sites like 0:27:22.720 --> 0:27:25.320 ours change the demand flow in such a way that 0:27:25.520 --> 0:27:27.320 Rolex or any brand just couldn't keep up with it. 0:27:27.320 --> 0:27:29.720 And then COVID everything changed, you know, Dict Covid, Covid. 0:27:29.840 --> 0:27:31.879 We'll talk a little bit about Covid, but so let 0:27:32.040 --> 0:27:36.360 let's talk about a couple of other smaller brands. I'm 0:27:36.400 --> 0:27:39.720 a fan of some of the h. Moser and Company. 0:27:40.200 --> 0:27:43.200 Grooble four S seems to have exploded. NB and F 0:27:43.400 --> 0:27:47.320 is next level Jacob and Company. Yeah, and that's before 0:27:47.400 --> 0:27:51.960 we get to artisans, the Geneva who have decided give 0:27:52.080 --> 0:27:54.720 us your Rolex and we'll slap one hundred thousand dollars 0:27:54.720 --> 0:27:56.600 worth of labor on it and make it one of 0:27:56.680 --> 0:28:00.359 a kind. Like this sort of thing start in the 0:28:00.440 --> 0:28:03.719 car industry on a very very small level. You can 0:28:03.840 --> 0:28:07.240 personalize your car, put stripes on it. But to take 0:28:07.320 --> 0:28:10.080 a thirty thousand dollars Rolex and turn into a six 0:28:10.200 --> 0:28:12.199 figure product pretty amazing. 0:28:12.359 --> 0:28:15.760 Yeah, I mean, Rolex is should be viewed differently than 0:28:15.800 --> 0:28:18.840 almost every other watch brand market shared to the giant. 0:28:18.880 --> 0:28:20.560 I mean in the US they're one half of all 0:28:20.640 --> 0:28:21.800 luxury watches, is that true? 0:28:21.960 --> 0:28:23.960 I know, globally it's twenty something, and. 0:28:25.440 --> 0:28:27.760 It's just enormous in this country. And you know, look, 0:28:27.960 --> 0:28:29.680 there are big if you go to India, if you 0:28:29.760 --> 0:28:32.360 go to Asia, there are brands such as Omega, Launjeans, 0:28:32.400 --> 0:28:34.840 et cetera that that could rival Rolex in terms of popularity. 0:28:35.040 --> 0:28:37.120 But in the US, this is Rolex country for sure. 0:28:37.840 --> 0:28:40.440 But they are they should be viewed separately from almost 0:28:40.440 --> 0:28:43.080 everybody else in the industry. As I said, the demand 0:28:43.160 --> 0:28:45.320 mechanism that they have is just so robust. It's like 0:28:45.320 --> 0:28:47.120 people don't even know why they want a Rolex, they 0:28:47.280 --> 0:28:50.200 just do. And almost no other brand in the luxury 0:28:50.200 --> 0:28:52.440 space and watch his car as anything really benefits from that. 0:28:52.680 --> 0:28:55.480 So quick funny story, I have a guest a couple 0:28:55.520 --> 0:28:58.840 of months ago, and he's wearing a reverse Panda, which 0:28:58.960 --> 0:29:01.920 is the Daytona chronograph with the white face and the 0:29:02.000 --> 0:29:05.080 black dials. And I don't remember what I was wearing. 0:29:05.280 --> 0:29:08.360 Was probably my my yacht Master is my daily driver. 0:29:09.000 --> 0:29:11.960 And I just happened after we'd done, I happened to 0:29:12.320 --> 0:29:15.080 mention it to him, and he said, about twenty years ago, 0:29:15.120 --> 0:29:16.920 when we first launched the firm, him and his partner 0:29:17.000 --> 0:29:19.440 got one and then went to their local ad and said, 0:29:19.480 --> 0:29:20.360 I need thirty of these. 0:29:20.760 --> 0:29:21.920 This is twenty years ago. 0:29:22.520 --> 0:29:25.640 And there why he goes every time we make someone 0:29:25.680 --> 0:29:27.000 a partner, we give them a daytime. 0:29:27.240 --> 0:29:29.479 Yeah, I like talk about it was a good investment. 0:29:29.520 --> 0:29:31.480 By the way, he's in private equity, he's got a 0:29:31.520 --> 0:29:34.800 good talk about spotting value before anybody else did. 0:29:35.200 --> 0:29:37.320 But that sort of thing could never happen. 0:29:37.360 --> 0:29:38.800 Well, no, Barry, you don't have to go that far 0:29:38.960 --> 0:29:41.760 back in time to get to a moment where it 0:29:41.960 --> 0:29:43.640 was possible to go into many of the brands you 0:29:43.800 --> 0:29:46.080 just named and asked for a discount. I don't watch 0:29:46.280 --> 0:29:47.959 how they have it available. You'd be able to get 0:29:47.960 --> 0:29:50.160 it for a discount ten years ago, five. 0:29:50.040 --> 0:29:52.360 Years ago, I mean, if you're talking about MBNF Moser 0:29:52.480 --> 0:29:53.640 three years ago, pre COVID. 0:29:53.760 --> 0:29:55.880 Yeah, I was looking at the torb On and the 0:29:55.920 --> 0:29:57.800 Mosar and just couldn't wrap my head around the price, 0:29:57.840 --> 0:30:01.200 and I couldn't pull the trigger. And now I regret it. 0:30:01.360 --> 0:30:04.200 Not because I'm a flipper. Every watch I've ever bought 0:30:04.200 --> 0:30:08.000 I still have unless I've given it away, but just 0:30:08.080 --> 0:30:09.800 the thought of like, oh, I'd love to have that 0:30:10.000 --> 0:30:11.440 for half of what that's gone for. 0:30:11.680 --> 0:30:13.720 Yeah, once you break that, this is going to sound awful, 0:30:13.760 --> 0:30:15.320 but here we are. You know, once you break one 0:30:15.360 --> 0:30:17.240 hundred thousand dollars market, it becomes a lot easier. Do 0:30:17.320 --> 0:30:18.760 it once and you can do all the time. 0:30:19.000 --> 0:30:21.960 A lot of demand, limited supply. I couldn't help but 0:30:22.080 --> 0:30:26.960 see Bloomberg headline last week Rolux and Protect investment beats 0:30:27.160 --> 0:30:30.120 S and P five hundred gains over the past five years. 0:30:30.440 --> 0:30:31.760 In other words, if you went out and bought a 0:30:31.800 --> 0:30:35.320 bunch of rollies and a couple of paddocks, you outperform 0:30:35.440 --> 0:30:39.440 the market. Is this what's driving the speculation in the 0:30:39.840 --> 0:30:40.560 watch industry. 0:30:40.880 --> 0:30:41.680 I think it's part of it. 0:30:41.760 --> 0:30:44.960 And again I think to really trace the history what 0:30:45.080 --> 0:30:47.080 got us here, you'd have to go back to again. 0:30:47.960 --> 0:30:50.000 You know, if I may say, sites like cud inky 0:30:50.720 --> 0:30:53.760 that really helped to kind of encourage more curiosity about 0:30:53.760 --> 0:30:56.400 this industry, build a community of people, more and more 0:30:56.640 --> 0:30:59.040 of whom are interested in this in this product category. 0:30:59.440 --> 0:31:01.640 I think you can can't ignore the impact of the 0:31:01.680 --> 0:31:03.320 Apple Watch, if I may say, I mean this was 0:31:03.400 --> 0:31:05.320 why is that? Well, this was meant to have been 0:31:05.480 --> 0:31:08.160 the nail and the coffin of the mechanical watch. 0:31:08.200 --> 0:31:10.400 So let's let's back that up a little bit, because 0:31:10.440 --> 0:31:13.360 I like where you're going with this so quartz crisis. 0:31:13.520 --> 0:31:17.000 You had all these cheap Japanese quartz watches using to 0:31:17.040 --> 0:31:21.640 maintain battery precise to seconds a year. And why do 0:31:21.760 --> 0:31:24.400 I need a complex, expensive mechanical watch when I get 0:31:24.440 --> 0:31:25.040 a cheap. 0:31:24.800 --> 0:31:27.680 Oh, we've seen we've seen this story before. This was 0:31:27.720 --> 0:31:29.760 meant to have been the end of the Swiss the 0:31:29.880 --> 0:31:33.560 mechanical watch industry in particular. Obviously, you know there there 0:31:33.600 --> 0:31:37.360 were some incredibly talented, committed executives at that time, any 0:31:37.400 --> 0:31:40.440 of whom are in particular you want to mention anything 0:31:40.480 --> 0:31:43.280 the one who probably gets and maybe deserves a must 0:31:43.280 --> 0:31:46.920 graviouldn't you grade is probably Jean lab there, Nick Kayak 0:31:46.960 --> 0:31:47.560 as well, you know. 0:31:47.960 --> 0:31:54.440 The designer of the uh Autemar Piget Oak and the. 0:31:56.360 --> 0:31:56.680 Jarl. 0:31:57.240 --> 0:31:59.680 Jenta has to get a lot of credit for saving 0:32:00.280 --> 0:32:03.400 the watch industry, right is yeah, where do you put 0:32:03.520 --> 0:32:04.480 these three guys in? 0:32:05.320 --> 0:32:07.840 If I got in? Yeah, it slightly different. So Jenta 0:32:08.040 --> 0:32:10.160 was early nineteen seventies and he was just a designer. 0:32:10.240 --> 0:32:12.200 So it's like saying, hey, like, design me a coffee cup. 0:32:12.320 --> 0:32:14.120 Here's a coffee cup. That's it. We're done now. You 0:32:14.200 --> 0:32:17.400 know what Ap and Petak and others did with Genta's 0:32:17.480 --> 0:32:19.640 design is really what allowed them to kind of continue 0:32:19.640 --> 0:32:21.800 to grow. But I think what what Jeff is referring 0:32:21.800 --> 0:32:24.600 to is really a decade later when courts really kind 0:32:24.640 --> 0:32:26.640 of came in, and to be clear, courts won. Like 0:32:26.920 --> 0:32:30.960 if you look at how many watch probably ninety nine percent, right, 0:32:31.160 --> 0:32:33.760 So just to be clear, like courts won. That doesn't 0:32:33.800 --> 0:32:36.040 mean that this that the Swiss didn't have its own 0:32:36.120 --> 0:32:39.080 little kind of pocketive influence and pocket of growth growth potential. 0:32:39.360 --> 0:32:41.920 But as Jeff is saying, Jean club Beaver, who revived 0:32:41.960 --> 0:32:43.800 blan Pond and then Omega in the nineties, he was 0:32:43.800 --> 0:32:45.800 the first one to sign James Bond and Sydney Crawford 0:32:45.800 --> 0:32:49.800 to Omega. Huge deal, mister Hyak who designed the Swatch, right, 0:32:49.880 --> 0:32:51.600 I mean that is a Swiss made watch for back 0:32:51.680 --> 0:32:54.560 then was probably what twenty five probably yeah, thirty. 0:32:54.360 --> 0:32:57.120 Bives and that's a giant right. People collected them like 0:32:57.200 --> 0:32:57.880 beanie babies. 0:32:58.360 --> 0:33:00.960 Swash in the eighties was as big than anything today. 0:33:00.960 --> 0:33:03.480 I mean just cannot be kind of surmised or can 0:33:03.560 --> 0:33:06.120 really understood today here, Swatch in the eighties was everything. 0:33:06.160 --> 0:33:08.400 It's because they turned watches into fashion. 0:33:08.080 --> 0:33:11.600 Exactly exactly that you still have a few tricks up. 0:33:11.520 --> 0:33:13.360 Their sleeve, right, Well, we just saw what they did 0:33:13.400 --> 0:33:14.720 with Omega, had. 0:33:14.640 --> 0:33:17.000 People lining up around the block to get to get 0:33:17.000 --> 0:33:17.240 a watch. 0:33:17.680 --> 0:33:17.800 Right. 0:33:18.120 --> 0:33:21.000 We've done five collaborations with Swatch, right, I mean Judikia, 0:33:21.080 --> 0:33:24.400 We've collaborated with Amez, with Laika, with Omega. I mean really, 0:33:24.560 --> 0:33:26.320 you know, high end brands, and we did with Swatch. 0:33:26.640 --> 0:33:28.480 And the guys that are buying our sixty thousand dollars 0:33:28.480 --> 0:33:30.640 of astron or whatever are also buying our swatches. 0:33:30.920 --> 0:33:35.960 Really absolutely so, I totally get the appeal of Asiko 0:33:36.560 --> 0:33:38.920 for three, four or five six hundred dollars you get 0:33:38.960 --> 0:33:41.880 a really well made watch. Question that looks pretty good, 0:33:42.000 --> 0:33:44.440 tells pretty good time. And if one of your nephews 0:33:44.480 --> 0:33:46.640 says something, oh you like it here, Yeah, it's not. 0:33:46.880 --> 0:33:48.320 It's I don't know if I would do that with this, 0:33:48.560 --> 0:33:52.920 but I certainly would do that with anything from Seiko, 0:33:53.040 --> 0:33:58.360 even some of the nicer divers that are experienced. But 0:33:58.600 --> 0:34:02.200 Swatch always, maybe it's my age, watch always struck me 0:34:02.240 --> 0:34:05.959 as kind of like a fun fashioning not a serious 0:34:06.080 --> 0:34:06.560 time people. 0:34:06.600 --> 0:34:09.640 Well, I mean, look, first of all, Swatch owns Blanc Pond, Brigue, Omegan. 0:34:09.760 --> 0:34:12.520 Oh the company I'm talking about the Schwatch watch exactly. 0:34:12.920 --> 0:34:14.080 The company is massive. 0:34:14.200 --> 0:34:14.359 Yeah. 0:34:14.680 --> 0:34:16.399 I would argue though that does it does it need 0:34:16.520 --> 0:34:19.239 to be something complicated, in something serious, because for some 0:34:19.320 --> 0:34:22.080 people that gets in the way of just the enjoyment 0:34:22.120 --> 0:34:22.839 of wearing the watch. 0:34:22.920 --> 0:34:26.000 I think, you know, I'm aware when I wear a 0:34:26.320 --> 0:34:28.799 very nice watch, I'm aware. Oh gee, am I going 0:34:28.840 --> 0:34:29.800 to get on the subway with this? 0:34:29.960 --> 0:34:32.759 Yeah? Very true, very true. We'll talk about what AP 0:34:33.000 --> 0:34:33.279 is doing. 0:34:34.000 --> 0:34:36.440 Yeah, with a Swatch, he probably wouldn't have that concern 0:34:36.640 --> 0:34:39.200 for sure. And I think you know there we talked 0:34:39.200 --> 0:34:41.880 about Gerald Genta, I mean his impact was surely from 0:34:41.920 --> 0:34:44.720 the design angle he's watched. One thing they've done incredibly 0:34:44.760 --> 0:34:47.960 well is just design great looking watches and design watches 0:34:48.000 --> 0:34:50.320 for different people with different appeals. It was in Paris 0:34:50.400 --> 0:34:53.359 recently they did a really cool collaboration with Cafe to Floor. 0:34:53.520 --> 0:34:56.160 We've talked about the Moon Swatch. I mean, ours our 0:34:56.200 --> 0:34:58.480 beautiful watches and are the ones that we've collaborated with 0:34:58.560 --> 0:35:01.040 Swatch on. So design something to watch is no firm. 0:35:01.080 --> 0:35:03.359 For some people, it's a it's fashion, you know, it's 0:35:03.400 --> 0:35:05.000 something that they put on in their part. 0:35:05.440 --> 0:35:08.200 So let's talk about the Apple Watch. Yeah, when when 0:35:08.280 --> 0:35:11.800 the Apple Watch comes out and it starts just selling 0:35:12.680 --> 0:35:15.360 crazy numbers, what was going on in Geneva? 0:35:15.400 --> 0:35:18.000 What would people think? They were terrified and really like 0:35:18.040 --> 0:35:19.560 here we go again, Oh my god. I mean it 0:35:19.680 --> 0:35:21.360 was the end of the end of time, right and 0:35:21.440 --> 0:35:23.759 in full transparency, I was consultant on the Apple Watch, 0:35:23.840 --> 0:35:25.960 like I helped. I helped them and Johnny I was 0:35:26.000 --> 0:35:28.839 on our second cover of our magazine. I mean, well, 0:35:29.239 --> 0:35:31.400 and so you know, I'm a lover of Apple Like 0:35:31.440 --> 0:35:33.200 I was just a designed guy. The guy who's spending 0:35:33.239 --> 0:35:34.840 money on business cards when he had no money, Like 0:35:35.480 --> 0:35:38.000 what Apple does is just remarkable. So it was honored 0:35:38.040 --> 0:35:40.080 to work on that project. And so I was actually 0:35:40.120 --> 0:35:42.279 the only person from the watching industry to attend the 0:35:42.360 --> 0:35:44.560 launch of the original Apple No kidd. And that story 0:35:44.600 --> 0:35:46.680 that I wrote, which was totally unbiased, Like even though 0:35:46.680 --> 0:35:48.560 I helped kind of work on it, it was like 0:35:48.840 --> 0:35:50.680 what they were doing with the Apple Watch in terms 0:35:50.719 --> 0:35:52.440 of materials and in terms of the way that the 0:35:52.520 --> 0:35:54.279 bracelets snapped on and off. I mean like it was 0:35:54.719 --> 0:35:57.040 miles ahead of Switzerland, miles and these things were four 0:35:57.120 --> 0:35:59.920 hundred dollars and that really really terrified the Swiss. And 0:36:00.080 --> 0:36:02.960 the Swiss are there there. They can be persnickety, for sure, 0:36:02.960 --> 0:36:05.719 and they really thought that anybody that was supporting the 0:36:05.719 --> 0:36:08.080 Apple Watch was an enemy, including us for a time, 0:36:08.239 --> 0:36:10.200 No kid, truly and we we still to this day. 0:36:10.280 --> 0:36:11.800 So Apple Watch more were proud to sell it. But 0:36:11.920 --> 0:36:14.279 it really got people to think about the wrist as 0:36:14.360 --> 0:36:17.760 real estate again, which they had not gone in a decade. 0:36:18.040 --> 0:36:21.280 The wrist as real estate. Yeah, huh, that's really interesting. 0:36:21.480 --> 0:36:23.640 So I noticed you're not wearing an Apple Watch, not today, 0:36:23.640 --> 0:36:25.320 and you're not wearing an app I was this weekend. 0:36:25.760 --> 0:36:29.440 I consider it a great privilege to not be notified 0:36:29.480 --> 0:36:30.560 about anything. 0:36:30.640 --> 0:36:34.520 Like to me, to me an Apple watch, an Apple watches. 0:36:34.920 --> 0:36:38.200 Wait, I'm tied into I'm getting Slack notifications, I'm getting 0:36:38.239 --> 0:36:41.120 Twitter notifications, I'm getting email and text leave me at 0:36:41.160 --> 0:36:41.920 the long Yeah. 0:36:41.800 --> 0:36:43.160 Yeah, that's kind of get it. 0:36:43.840 --> 0:36:45.880 And I know a lot of people that you know, 0:36:46.320 --> 0:36:48.080 if they lost their roll ups, they'd be upset, but 0:36:48.120 --> 0:36:50.400 they couldn't go a day without their look, their Apple. 0:36:50.600 --> 0:36:52.239 The Apple Watch, you can make whatever you want it 0:36:52.280 --> 0:36:53.840 to be. So I wear it solely when I go 0:36:53.880 --> 0:36:55.160 to the gym and when I play off, that's it. 0:36:55.280 --> 0:36:57.319 That's the only time that I wear Historically, I used 0:36:57.360 --> 0:36:59.480 to win a few versions ago. I had one that 0:36:59.600 --> 0:37:01.520 was selled, and I would leave my phone at home 0:37:01.520 --> 0:37:03.200 when I would go driving, and I might need a 0:37:03.320 --> 0:37:05.759 vintage car to kind of escape. But so I use 0:37:05.760 --> 0:37:08.200 it for two things, working out and really working out, 0:37:08.239 --> 0:37:11.600 and that's it's But I do not have notifications of emails, texts, 0:37:11.600 --> 0:37:13.600 et cetera. It's really for me giving input to it. 0:37:13.920 --> 0:37:15.800 How many steps did I take, what kind of calories 0:37:15.800 --> 0:37:16.960 have I burned? Et cetera. 0:37:17.560 --> 0:37:19.600 And you you don't want to wear a nice watch 0:37:19.640 --> 0:37:22.719 when you're golfing anyway, because the little pistons that hold 0:37:22.760 --> 0:37:25.959 the face in place will snap if you're wearing a watch, 0:37:26.239 --> 0:37:29.359 yeah and swimming the golf or good. Yeah, you could 0:37:29.360 --> 0:37:31.600 always buy a reshard meal. Yeah, I mean that's probably 0:37:31.600 --> 0:37:34.080 the most responsible thing to do, exactly. You know, we'll 0:37:34.120 --> 0:37:36.200 get those financially response, get the one, the rough m 0:37:36.280 --> 0:37:40.080 the dolarwares. Yeah there, but it's on his other hands, 0:37:40.120 --> 0:37:40.360 isn't it. 0:37:40.440 --> 0:37:43.000 It's not on his uh but but Bubba Watson has 0:37:43.080 --> 0:37:44.680 his own reshard meal and he wears it every time 0:37:44.719 --> 0:37:48.080 he plays. No, kidd is it's pink, right, it's pink 0:37:48.160 --> 0:37:51.120 now is originally white, but yes, funny and a pink 0:37:51.200 --> 0:37:54.960 three million his was when it launches around six fifty. 0:37:55.000 --> 0:37:56.719 I would guess now probably run a million. 0:37:56.840 --> 0:37:59.719 Right, So so forget strapping a BMW two your wrist. 0:38:00.120 --> 0:38:02.759 That's a very nice three bedroom condo. Oh yeah, yes, 0:38:03.320 --> 0:38:08.360 place two bedroom condo with yeah, yeah, exactly. And you 0:38:08.480 --> 0:38:11.560 know that not everybody is going to be comfortable, or 0:38:12.000 --> 0:38:14.000 even the people who can afford it. A lot of 0:38:14.040 --> 0:38:18.720 people look at Watchnista's for lack of a better word, 0:38:18.840 --> 0:38:19.200 and like. 0:38:19.400 --> 0:38:22.520 You guys are crazy. Yeah, And I think to some degree. 0:38:22.680 --> 0:38:25.080 Everyone that's passionate about anything is a little bit crazy. Sure, 0:38:25.480 --> 0:38:26.880 But I think also if you look at I mean, 0:38:26.880 --> 0:38:28.840 the other thing that I'm interested in like you is cars. 0:38:28.880 --> 0:38:30.360 And so if you look at the running costs of 0:38:30.400 --> 0:38:31.759 a great car, Let's say you buy a car and 0:38:31.880 --> 0:38:34.520 watch both fifty thousand dollars right right, own it for 0:38:34.600 --> 0:38:36.080 on them both for ten years, get the ing German 0:38:36.160 --> 0:38:38.440 for both for ten years, to watch you. Basically, if 0:38:38.480 --> 0:38:40.200 you want to have insurance, you can. You don't have 0:38:40.280 --> 0:38:41.960 to have a storagees nothing, put it in a drawer, 0:38:42.000 --> 0:38:46.120 a safety deposit box. Cars, insurance, maintenance, parking cars are 0:38:46.280 --> 0:38:48.480 so much more expensive you want to maintain as a 0:38:48.480 --> 0:38:50.960 collectible assets. So it's remarkable and I do both, so 0:38:51.040 --> 0:38:54.399 I know. But watches they can do so much more 0:38:54.520 --> 0:38:54.960 than cars. 0:38:55.000 --> 0:38:57.360 Eight you're wearing. You're wearing them right now, so am I, 0:38:57.480 --> 0:38:58.040 so is Jeff. 0:38:58.400 --> 0:39:01.560 And these are things that like these are real almost 0:39:01.600 --> 0:39:04.920 Housman's for for for people's lives, and so like when 0:39:04.960 --> 0:39:07.600 my daughter was born in December twenty twenty one, I 0:39:07.680 --> 0:39:10.000 gave my mother, my mother in law, and my wife 0:39:10.080 --> 0:39:12.200 a watch each to celebrate the birth of her. And 0:39:12.280 --> 0:39:14.560 those watches are hers and like, you know, for until 0:39:14.800 --> 0:39:16.640 until the day that she dies, you know, hopefully long 0:39:16.719 --> 0:39:19.160 far away, those watches of hers and she'll remember that 0:39:19.360 --> 0:39:20.759 that these were given, you know, the day that. 0:39:20.760 --> 0:39:21.799 She was a milestone. 0:39:22.640 --> 0:39:24.480 And I think you know the omega that my grandfather 0:39:24.560 --> 0:39:26.520 gave me. That watch changed my life. I can wear 0:39:26.520 --> 0:39:28.960 it every day. When my daughter was born, I was 0:39:29.000 --> 0:39:31.360 wearing that watch. And when I asked my wife to 0:39:31.400 --> 0:39:33.160 wear to marry me, I was wearing that watch. 0:39:33.200 --> 0:39:34.120 And what'd you get married? In? 0:39:35.000 --> 0:39:37.000 A ptec A Protect fifty two seventy all right? 0:39:37.000 --> 0:39:39.000 Because you weren't fooling around. This was a serious that 0:39:39.120 --> 0:39:40.840 was Yeah, we were not messing around. We were in 0:39:40.960 --> 0:39:42.520 Rome and yeah, it was. It was. 0:39:42.600 --> 0:39:43.120 It was a good one. 0:39:43.480 --> 0:39:46.040 When you travel, do you travel with multiple watches either? 0:39:46.520 --> 0:39:49.919 Yeah, it depends on where I'm traveling to. Recently, we're 0:39:50.000 --> 0:39:52.879 in Geneva for Watches and Wonders, the big international trade 0:39:52.920 --> 0:39:55.320 show of watches. I think I had nine watches for 0:39:55.440 --> 0:39:55.839 that event. 0:39:55.920 --> 0:39:57.880 Really so different. Watch twice a day. 0:39:58.040 --> 0:40:00.920 Yeah, multiple times, multiple watches in this same day. Sometimes, 0:40:01.000 --> 0:40:03.359 you know, your meeting with a brand partner you want 0:40:03.360 --> 0:40:06.359 to represent. Sure, sometimes I'll bring one watch if I'm 0:40:06.400 --> 0:40:08.680 going or two watches usually as a minimum. If I'm going, 0:40:08.760 --> 0:40:10.359 you know, on a golf trip, I'll bring a watch 0:40:10.440 --> 0:40:12.960 I wear golfing. I'll bring another watch that's sort of 0:40:13.000 --> 0:40:15.880 like a daily wear, usually something that can kind of 0:40:15.960 --> 0:40:18.560 go with different types of looks and outfits and activities. 0:40:18.680 --> 0:40:20.919 But and just for the record, Ben. 0:40:20.920 --> 0:40:22.560 Mentioned you know you don't have to ensure what you 0:40:22.600 --> 0:40:24.880 should ensure your watch, especially if you're traveling with it, 0:40:25.080 --> 0:40:27.880 especially if you value it. Inside note, we offer insurance 0:40:27.880 --> 0:40:28.279 hooting and. 0:40:28.320 --> 0:40:29.960 We're going to talk a little bit about that. But 0:40:30.080 --> 0:40:32.759 as since you brought it up, someone asked me this 0:40:32.880 --> 0:40:35.239 question the other day. I said, I don't know the answer, 0:40:35.320 --> 0:40:38.200 but I know the guys that do you have a 0:40:39.880 --> 0:40:42.520 writer on your home insurance with a number of watches 0:40:42.600 --> 0:40:45.799 listed you travel with that watch? Is that covered under 0:40:45.800 --> 0:40:48.279 your homeowner's insurance or do you need to have a 0:40:48.560 --> 0:40:50.160 separate policy on them. 0:40:50.280 --> 0:40:52.839 There are lots of questions like that that you could 0:40:53.000 --> 0:40:57.439 ask when discussing how a homeowner's insurance policy could cover 0:40:57.560 --> 0:40:59.680 the value of a loss or stolen or downage watch. 0:41:00.000 --> 0:41:02.080 I would just say ignore all those questions because, to 0:41:02.160 --> 0:41:04.440 be honest, the best way to ensure your watch is 0:41:04.520 --> 0:41:06.840 not to attach it or assign it to your homeowners policy. 0:41:07.280 --> 0:41:10.319 Itated Yeah, I mean, we've had stories from people who 0:41:10.400 --> 0:41:12.200 had to make a claim on a damage or lost 0:41:12.280 --> 0:41:14.640 watch while it was a part of their homeowners insurance. 0:41:14.680 --> 0:41:17.200 Then their homeowners insurance got canceled and they couldn't get 0:41:17.239 --> 0:41:20.160 homeowners insurance. Again, it's just not a situation when we 0:41:20.280 --> 0:41:21.359 want to find yourself. 0:41:21.040 --> 0:41:23.440 I total de car at five miles an hour, I 0:41:23.480 --> 0:41:25.880 got t boned, and I had that exact same thing 0:41:25.920 --> 0:41:28.360 happen right the homeowners and the umbrella was canceled and 0:41:28.480 --> 0:41:31.439 you had to scramble to replace it. Because it's easy 0:41:31.560 --> 0:41:34.920 enough to get homeowners an umbrella is a little more complicated. 0:41:35.120 --> 0:41:37.799 Yeah. In twenty twenty one, we actually launched our own 0:41:37.800 --> 0:41:40.399 insurance program that that myself and a job with Job 0:41:40.440 --> 0:41:43.040 So Chubb is the underwriter, but we conceived this product ourselves. 0:41:43.120 --> 0:41:45.480 This is a totally unique product designed for watch collectors, 0:41:45.719 --> 0:41:47.480 so it has nothing to do with homeowners, nothing to 0:41:47.520 --> 0:41:50.799 do with anything else. And you can dynamically and really 0:41:50.880 --> 0:41:54.640 retroactively assign and unassigned insurance attachments to any watch, so 0:41:54.719 --> 0:41:56.399 like you're out of the house right now, you could 0:41:56.480 --> 0:41:57.920 ensure that watch when you go home tonight and put 0:41:57.960 --> 0:41:59.600 in your safe, turn it off, do it all on 0:41:59.640 --> 0:42:01.719 your phone. And so it's all in the hood Inky app. 0:42:01.800 --> 0:42:03.880 It's underwritten by chub, so you know, best in class. 0:42:04.120 --> 0:42:06.200 It's really an amazing thing that truly like, Like I 0:42:06.280 --> 0:42:09.000 can say, you can critique Codnky for anything you want, 0:42:09.080 --> 0:42:11.359 but our insurance product is better than anybody else's by far. 0:42:11.560 --> 0:42:12.560 I'm gonna take a look at that. 0:42:12.800 --> 0:42:14.440 Yeah, a little bit interest. 0:42:15.120 --> 0:42:16.719 And by the way, you guys did a very nice 0:42:16.800 --> 0:42:17.920 job on the app. 0:42:18.280 --> 0:42:18.759 Oh thank you. 0:42:19.360 --> 0:42:21.279 I'm still waiting for Bring a Trail at a roll 0:42:21.320 --> 0:42:22.879 On and I don't. 0:42:23.160 --> 0:42:24.279 And they did a billion. 0:42:24.040 --> 0:42:27.640 Dollars in sales. I sold one hundred thousandth car. 0:42:27.800 --> 0:42:28.120 Amazing. 0:42:28.400 --> 0:42:32.240 They definitely need to uh but but this is something 0:42:33.200 --> 0:42:35.320 you guys were Internet. 0:42:35.760 --> 0:42:36.480 Although so were they? 0:42:36.800 --> 0:42:38.960 Yeah right, didn't they start out as Yeah? 0:42:39.000 --> 0:42:41.120 So I've known Randy who started Bring a Trailer for 0:42:41.280 --> 0:42:42.799 ten plus years. We used to do a column called 0:42:42.800 --> 0:42:44.520 bring a Loop that was very much inspired by Bring 0:42:44.600 --> 0:42:47.160 a Trailer. Know those guys super well. I mean they've 0:42:47.239 --> 0:42:49.799 done amazing things that abstoually sold to hurst in look 0:42:49.880 --> 0:42:52.520 Covid and good on them. I mean they've they've got 0:42:52.520 --> 0:42:54.680 a great thing going. I mean, they really you know, 0:42:54.760 --> 0:42:56.320 we admire a lot about what they do. I know 0:42:56.360 --> 0:42:58.800 that they admire a lot about what we do, but 0:42:58.880 --> 0:43:01.080 they've been able to to really own the collectible car 0:43:01.160 --> 0:43:02.399 category in an amazing way. 0:43:02.760 --> 0:43:06.400 You guys talk about what you were doing during the pandemic. 0:43:06.480 --> 0:43:09.000 I know a lot of people with streaming Netflix, bring 0:43:09.080 --> 0:43:12.799 a trailer and ho dinky is what kept me occupied out? 0:43:13.840 --> 0:43:17.040 Yeah yeah, and you know, to the detriment of my 0:43:17.120 --> 0:43:20.360 bank account, but to the betterment of my wrist and garage. 0:43:20.800 --> 0:43:23.840 So it was. And I mean I was into this 0:43:23.960 --> 0:43:27.120 sort of stuff long before, but it's just amazing. 0:43:27.239 --> 0:43:28.920 How gee, I'm not commuting. 0:43:29.080 --> 0:43:33.440 I'm getting so much work done from home in my pajamas, unshowered. 0:43:33.760 --> 0:43:35.400 We had a rule in our house you had a 0:43:35.440 --> 0:43:38.320 shower once a week, whether you need to or not. 0:43:38.480 --> 0:43:40.960 I mean, it was just you know, and occasionally get 0:43:40.960 --> 0:43:43.680 out of your pajamas. But it was just really easy 0:43:43.719 --> 0:43:47.560 to say, I'm done with everything, now let me wordle 0:43:47.840 --> 0:43:50.600 and then oh dinky, and then bring a trailer. It 0:43:50.960 --> 0:43:54.480 was it kept everybody entertaining, all right. So let's talk 0:43:54.480 --> 0:43:59.040 a little bit more about retailing. You launched the shop 0:43:59.320 --> 0:44:03.040 in twenty twelve. You're now doing one hundred million plus 0:44:03.320 --> 0:44:06.480 in revenue. Yep, congrats, that's a real number. It is. 0:44:06.560 --> 0:44:08.920 Thank you, But you guys are also expanding that you 0:44:09.040 --> 0:44:11.200 bought Crown and Caliber and tell us a little bit 0:44:11.200 --> 0:44:13.759 about the thinking of behind the purchase. Yeah. 0:44:13.880 --> 0:44:17.200 So twenty twelve, the first Shopify site was set up 0:44:17.719 --> 0:44:20.160 to sell some straps and related accessories. At the time, 0:44:20.200 --> 0:44:22.000 I think Ben and the team would would pop up 0:44:22.000 --> 0:44:25.080 at occasional you know men's men's wear flea markets things 0:44:25.160 --> 0:44:28.040 like that were always sort of like scrappy and you know, 0:44:28.200 --> 0:44:31.240 trying to connect you know, lovers of watches with products 0:44:31.239 --> 0:44:33.920 that they love. Limited editions, as Ben mentioned, was a 0:44:33.960 --> 0:44:36.680 big push towards the commercial side. That was around twenty fifteen. 0:44:37.120 --> 0:44:39.479 The first watches. The first one was was a Max 0:44:39.560 --> 0:44:43.480 buser Watch MBNF, so beautiful, beautiful, limited edition collection. And 0:44:43.520 --> 0:44:45.839 then it wasn't until twenty seventeen. And I say twenty 0:44:45.880 --> 0:44:48.359 seventeen I emphasized that because that's not that long ago 0:44:48.760 --> 0:44:52.360 that Hoodinky was the first online only authorized retailer of watches. 0:44:52.400 --> 0:44:55.440 So that, yeah, that reticence to kind of move online 0:44:55.480 --> 0:44:58.120 and really see online as a channel as a commercial channel. 0:44:58.480 --> 0:45:00.719 I mean that that that sort of ail wasn't pierced 0:45:00.760 --> 0:45:05.120 until twenty seventeens. And Hoodinky was really the trailblazer, launched 0:45:05.200 --> 0:45:08.400 with eight brands as authorized retail partners up and now 0:45:08.440 --> 0:45:10.840 we're up to about forty brands, so, you know, not 0:45:11.040 --> 0:45:13.080 a nice list of brands, it's a great list of brands. 0:45:13.120 --> 0:45:14.719 I mean, you know for some of them where they're 0:45:14.840 --> 0:45:19.560 only online authorized partners, so Arimez, Apple, Omega. You know, 0:45:19.760 --> 0:45:22.400 for those three brands, the only other retailer besides themselves 0:45:22.440 --> 0:45:24.880 who sells their watches as an online only channel is Hoodinky. 0:45:25.400 --> 0:45:31.560 But then Omega is probably second second substantial oh yeah, 0:45:31.960 --> 0:45:35.799 substantial watch elo with hundreds of models, it seems. 0:45:35.520 --> 0:45:37.880 Ye oh yeah. I'm look, they sponsor the Olympics, they 0:45:37.920 --> 0:45:41.080 sponsored James Bond. I mean this is a global, global brand. Yep. 0:45:41.320 --> 0:45:43.600 So, but at that point in time, Hoodinky is still 0:45:43.800 --> 0:45:47.319 new watches, limited edition projects, which you're not doing them 0:45:47.360 --> 0:45:49.640 every week or sometimes not even every month. We do 0:45:49.719 --> 0:45:52.920 about a dozen a year. Uh, And then vintage watches, 0:45:52.960 --> 0:45:54.920 which you know, there's always a market for collectors who 0:45:54.960 --> 0:45:57.360 want a vintage watch. Really a one of one define 0:45:57.520 --> 0:46:01.480 vintage typically defined US a watch that's before nineteen nineties. 0:46:01.600 --> 0:46:03.000 Okay, you know when. 0:46:02.960 --> 0:46:06.719 Did the modern US watches start showing up on hote King? 0:46:06.800 --> 0:46:08.520 When did you decide to do modern use? 0:46:08.680 --> 0:46:10.799 Yeah, so that would be the pre owned category as 0:46:10.840 --> 0:46:12.880 pre owned distinct from vintage, and that they're both pre 0:46:12.960 --> 0:46:16.560 owned technically, but vintage will be nineteen nineties and before, yeah, 0:46:16.560 --> 0:46:18.480 and pre owned would be you know again, a modern 0:46:18.520 --> 0:46:21.080 IT eighty could actually be a watch that someone else 0:46:21.160 --> 0:46:24.080 has just purchased and is flipping. They've never worn it. 0:46:24.160 --> 0:46:24.719 It's in its. 0:46:24.640 --> 0:46:28.160 Original box with original papers. That was with the purchase 0:46:28.200 --> 0:46:30.040 of Crown and Caliber, which was the business that we 0:46:30.080 --> 0:46:32.799 acquired that you mentioned. That was in February twenty twenty one. 0:46:33.320 --> 0:46:35.800 I think, you know, looking back as an outsider, I 0:46:35.920 --> 0:46:37.359 was not involved with the business at that time. An 0:46:37.400 --> 0:46:40.719 incredibly shrewd decision because basically online at this point, you 0:46:40.840 --> 0:46:44.440 still have very very few brands that have meaningfully moved 0:46:44.560 --> 0:46:47.440 their new watch sales online, some not at all. So 0:46:47.600 --> 0:46:51.160 Rolex doesn't sell online, ap doesn't sell online, Paddock doesn't 0:46:51.239 --> 0:46:54.000 sell online. Even authorized dealers of those watches are not 0:46:54.120 --> 0:46:56.800 allowed to sell the watches online. You can see the 0:46:56.840 --> 0:46:59.360 reference information. Then it will say visit a retailer, and 0:46:59.400 --> 0:47:02.480 then and a local retailer. The only way you can 0:47:02.600 --> 0:47:04.799 buy those watches online is to buy them pre owned 0:47:04.920 --> 0:47:07.040 and pre owned, which you know, as Ben mentioned earlier, 0:47:07.600 --> 0:47:09.680 used to be quite a wild West sort of shady 0:47:09.840 --> 0:47:12.400 business online certainly not something that you would kind of 0:47:12.680 --> 0:47:16.000 you wouldn't use catchwords like trust or authority or authenticity. 0:47:16.560 --> 0:47:21.040 It was really kind of buyer beware situations. The online channel, 0:47:21.200 --> 0:47:23.480 you know, really had a lot of opportunity to be 0:47:23.600 --> 0:47:25.920 cleaned up. And I would say that Crown and Caliber, 0:47:26.000 --> 0:47:28.120 a business that's been around now for a decade or so, 0:47:28.640 --> 0:47:30.359 is one of those business that was doing a very 0:47:30.360 --> 0:47:32.759 good job of playing the game in a clean way. 0:47:33.480 --> 0:47:35.640 They were buying the watches that they were selling, taking 0:47:35.680 --> 0:47:38.040 ownership of those watches, which I think says a lot 0:47:38.120 --> 0:47:39.920 because it means that they were willing to vouch for 0:47:39.960 --> 0:47:42.719 those watches in terms of their authenticity, the quality. They 0:47:42.800 --> 0:47:45.800 had invested in a true watch shop in Atlanta, Georgia, 0:47:45.840 --> 0:47:48.279 where the business was found in its base. So you have, 0:47:48.480 --> 0:47:51.120 you know, watchmakers who have graduated from the likes of 0:47:51.200 --> 0:47:54.919 the Rolex School watchmaking, the Reachmont Technical Center in Dallas, 0:47:54.960 --> 0:47:58.600 Texas to have real, real train skilled artisans that are 0:47:58.680 --> 0:48:01.200 able to repair and service walk to make sure that 0:48:01.239 --> 0:48:03.600 when those watches are being sold to the next owner 0:48:03.719 --> 0:48:05.920 that they're in as good a condition as that when 0:48:05.920 --> 0:48:10.360 they were originally sold. That Basically, the acquisition by Hoodinky 0:48:10.360 --> 0:48:12.959 allowed Hoodinky you kind of fast forward its way into 0:48:13.080 --> 0:48:15.680 being a player in the pre on space, which is 0:48:16.080 --> 0:48:18.960 a larger market than the new watch market online about 0:48:19.000 --> 0:48:21.839 thirty percent of pre on watches are sold online versus 0:48:21.920 --> 0:48:23.960 only about five percent of new watches that are sold. 0:48:24.000 --> 0:48:27.239 Thirty percent. That's an amazing statistic. I never would have 0:48:27.280 --> 0:48:32.920 guessed it was that large. You mentioned authenticity there. There 0:48:33.040 --> 0:48:35.960 are lots of replicas out there. What do you guys 0:48:36.040 --> 0:48:40.200 make of the super replicas that without a loop? Certainly 0:48:40.320 --> 0:48:44.279 from a risk distance, it's hard to tell. Like in 0:48:44.320 --> 0:48:47.120 the old days, you would see a fake Rolex Chinatown, 0:48:47.200 --> 0:48:48.239 twenty five bucks. 0:48:48.040 --> 0:48:49.239 With a ticking secondary right. 0:48:49.160 --> 0:48:53.120 Exactly, Yeah, no sweep and it would jingle and you 0:48:53.160 --> 0:48:55.000 know its the best twenty five bucks you could spend 0:48:55.040 --> 0:48:58.759 in the world. Watches and kept pretty good time today, 0:49:00.160 --> 0:49:03.880 pretty impressive, yeah, now, and they're pre sophisticated counterfeit pieces 0:49:03.920 --> 0:49:06.400 out there China mostly right, Some that you know, go 0:49:06.560 --> 0:49:10.000 so far as to include all like manufacture original parts 0:49:10.120 --> 0:49:11.799 on the outside of the watch. And it's only when 0:49:11.840 --> 0:49:14.239 you get inside into the movement that you understand that 0:49:14.320 --> 0:49:16.719 the movement has some parts or the original movement has 0:49:16.760 --> 0:49:19.360 been swapped out. You're telling me Rolux doesn't come with 0:49:19.480 --> 0:49:21.200 a twelve dollars Chinese. 0:49:22.040 --> 0:49:22.920 They don't don't do that. 0:49:23.120 --> 0:49:24.560 No, No, that's not the case that. 0:49:24.719 --> 0:49:27.680 By the way, the new transparent case back on the Daytona. 0:49:28.600 --> 0:49:31.120 Is this something that we're going to start to see 0:49:31.200 --> 0:49:35.960 more of as an anti counterfeit or that just happens. 0:49:35.640 --> 0:49:38.440 To be a pretty titanium watch. My my guess. Look, 0:49:38.480 --> 0:49:39.800 I don't know it all, to be clear, and I 0:49:39.840 --> 0:49:41.640 really mean that, I don't think that has anything to 0:49:41.680 --> 0:49:43.800 do with anti counterfeit, and I think it's more celebratory 0:49:43.840 --> 0:49:45.560 and they want to show off the new movement, et cetera. 0:49:45.600 --> 0:49:48.000 And to be clear, it's only in the platinum Daytona. 0:49:47.719 --> 0:49:50.480 Which, even which is unfortunate. The one of the nice 0:49:50.480 --> 0:49:53.080 things about Langa is every one of their watches has 0:49:53.120 --> 0:49:55.719 a display case back, which is quite This is. 0:49:55.760 --> 0:49:58.200 Really one of the I mean look, every not ivy Omega, 0:49:58.239 --> 0:50:02.320 but a lot. I mean, so does scant Acos. I 0:50:02.360 --> 0:50:04.560 mean it's it's it is uncommon for a high end 0:50:04.560 --> 0:50:07.560 watchman to not today, but it wasn't always the case. Sure, 0:50:07.880 --> 0:50:08.600 yeah right yeah. 0:50:08.920 --> 0:50:12.200 So so how big of an issue are these super counterfeits? 0:50:12.400 --> 0:50:14.960 I mean, for us, they're not a major issue. And 0:50:15.120 --> 0:50:17.440 that's again down to the fact that we've had we 0:50:17.560 --> 0:50:19.480 have an investment in people that are able to sort 0:50:19.480 --> 0:50:21.520 of sess them out. And that's even before we get 0:50:21.560 --> 0:50:24.080 them in our possession. We have pretty good you know tracker. 0:50:23.920 --> 0:50:26.520 You can eyebowl something on it just a photo. Some 0:50:26.600 --> 0:50:30.080 of the sock ex selling Sneakers has a counterfeit division, yeah, 0:50:30.080 --> 0:50:32.279 because they were getting so many fake nikes coming in. 0:50:33.080 --> 0:50:35.120 We we have a staff of authenticated yeah, truly. And 0:50:35.200 --> 0:50:36.920 then the benefit of us being us is we have 0:50:37.160 --> 0:50:39.759 direct relationships with brands and we can say, hey, bright 0:50:39.840 --> 0:50:42.400 Ley and grand Seiko, whoever was this watch born with 0:50:42.480 --> 0:50:44.359 a black dial or blue? We can track the serial 0:50:44.480 --> 0:50:47.600 number two and not not many people on the pre 0:50:47.680 --> 0:50:49.320 own side can do that. And as Jeff said, I 0:50:49.360 --> 0:50:51.440 think you know much credit to Hamilton Powell, who's the 0:50:51.480 --> 0:50:53.799 founder of Credit Caliber the business that that we now 0:50:53.920 --> 0:50:56.239 that we now own. You know, he really wanted to 0:50:56.320 --> 0:50:58.840 do stuff that is like, buying a watch is one thing, 0:50:58.880 --> 0:51:00.719 but selling a watch is actually brutal. And if you've 0:51:00.719 --> 0:51:02.439 ever tried to sell a watch, which doesn't really sound 0:51:02.480 --> 0:51:04.799 like you have, it's awful. And so if you want 0:51:04.880 --> 0:51:06.640 to do it, either go to Corona twenty four and 0:51:06.719 --> 0:51:08.560 it may never sell. You go to auction. They're gonna 0:51:08.560 --> 0:51:11.440 take twenty percent. With crownic Caliber and now Hoodinky, we're 0:51:11.440 --> 0:51:13.200 gonna tell you what we're gonna pay then and there 0:51:13.239 --> 0:51:14.520 you're gonna send in the watch. We're gonna send you 0:51:14.520 --> 0:51:14.799 a check. 0:51:14.840 --> 0:51:15.080 That's it. 0:51:15.200 --> 0:51:15.560 You're done. 0:51:15.719 --> 0:51:17.800 So I tell I'll tell you that sounds like a 0:51:17.840 --> 0:51:20.320 lot of fun. So you take them on consigned, we 0:51:20.400 --> 0:51:22.040 owne that you buy that we're cutting your check. 0:51:22.160 --> 0:51:24.960 Yeah, no kidding. So one of the few I. 0:51:24.960 --> 0:51:27.200 Didn't realize that think it's big. That's a big difference. 0:51:27.320 --> 0:51:29.600 Instant quoting about eighty percent of the watches as well. 0:51:29.640 --> 0:51:32.400 So again you go on to Crowncaliber dot com, Hoodinky 0:51:32.440 --> 0:51:34.960 dot com. You type in the reference number, some information 0:51:35.080 --> 0:51:37.800 Rolex Batman, etcetera, ask a couple of clarifying questions you 0:51:37.840 --> 0:51:39.680 get a quote right then and there, and if you 0:51:39.840 --> 0:51:42.239 like that quote, you send the watch in. We authenticate, 0:51:42.560 --> 0:51:44.640 inspect that, make sure that it is as it was described, 0:51:44.840 --> 0:51:45.440 send you a check. 0:51:45.480 --> 0:51:47.879 You'll have a check right away. So my brother has 0:51:47.920 --> 0:51:48.759 a Vacheron. 0:51:50.040 --> 0:51:54.320 I forgot the model. It's one of their more globe 0:51:54.440 --> 0:51:56.200 trot or something popular. 0:51:56.280 --> 0:51:59.200 Overseas, overseas, overseas, but they came. 0:51:59.040 --> 0:52:01.319 Out with a black dot and he has a blue dial, 0:52:01.360 --> 0:52:03.279 and I've never seen a blue dial else. 0:52:03.520 --> 0:52:06.520 That's a classic fashionround color. That blue dial is gorgeous. 0:52:06.600 --> 0:52:07.959 And very deep. 0:52:08.160 --> 0:52:11.280 I literally have never seen that anywhere else in blue. 0:52:12.000 --> 0:52:13.840 I'm gonna send him over to you guys, because he 0:52:14.040 --> 0:52:17.840 wants to sell it, and I had no idea you 0:52:17.920 --> 0:52:20.960 guys would would cut a check like that. So we're 0:52:21.000 --> 0:52:23.600 talking about online retailing, but I'm gonna throw one of 0:52:23.760 --> 0:52:27.319 your quotes back at you, which is physical retail will 0:52:27.360 --> 0:52:29.719 always have a home in luxury and watches. Of course, 0:52:29.880 --> 0:52:34.640 I think in everything, in everything, So sometimes like one 0:52:34.680 --> 0:52:37.239 of the things I like about the yacht Master is 0:52:37.760 --> 0:52:40.960 it has a hef You feel it. Yeah, when I 0:52:41.800 --> 0:52:43.880 Baltic makes some nice watches, you put him on your 0:52:43.880 --> 0:52:48.320 wrist you're unaware you're wearing. And even this has a 0:52:48.360 --> 0:52:51.399 little bit of a half which is mostly the pink gold. 0:52:51.480 --> 0:52:55.959 But you know, how easily can you buy a watch 0:52:56.040 --> 0:52:57.760 that you've never had on before? 0:52:58.239 --> 0:53:00.200 Pretty easily. We do about one hundred million dollars year 0:53:00.239 --> 0:53:03.080 worth of it. Yeah, okay, so let me rephrase that. 0:53:03.400 --> 0:53:07.879 How how comfortable can so if you know what you want? Right? 0:53:08.239 --> 0:53:11.040 So? The Moser tor me on in vans of black 0:53:11.560 --> 0:53:13.759 kind of an interesting watch. I've had it on in 0:53:13.880 --> 0:53:17.080 the in the ice blue and the dark blue. I'm 0:53:17.160 --> 0:53:19.000 not sure which way I would pull the trigger in that, 0:53:19.360 --> 0:53:21.400 but I've worn it and I'm like, Okay. 0:53:21.239 --> 0:53:22.640 I'm comfortable with this watch. 0:53:23.000 --> 0:53:26.520 But if I've never tried a watch on before that 0:53:26.920 --> 0:53:31.200 the new ice blue Daytona with the brown bezel, if 0:53:31.200 --> 0:53:34.680 you're going to drop, you know again an S class 0:53:34.760 --> 0:53:37.840 on your wrist. Can you do that online or do 0:53:37.960 --> 0:53:40.200 you want to go in and experience it? 0:53:40.360 --> 0:53:43.000 Well, everyone's different for sure. To be clear, Rolex doesn't 0:53:43.000 --> 0:53:45.320 sell online anywhere with anybody, not not with us, not 0:53:45.440 --> 0:53:48.120 with not even themselves. So no Rolex New can you 0:53:48.160 --> 0:53:48.680 buy online? 0:53:48.760 --> 0:53:49.200 Just right here? 0:53:49.480 --> 0:53:51.399 But like, let's use a brand that that we sell 0:53:51.440 --> 0:53:53.719 because this happens every day. A brand new Omega speed Master, 0:53:53.800 --> 0:53:55.640 which is about a seven thousand dollars watch that fire 0:53:55.719 --> 0:53:58.879 case back, great manly wound, iconic thing. We sell those 0:53:58.960 --> 0:54:01.200 all day long, and if people don't like it, they 0:54:01.280 --> 0:54:02.719 can return it, right and so. 0:54:02.920 --> 0:54:05.080 Thirty days so longly you give them to Yeah, I 0:54:05.120 --> 0:54:06.240 think it's fourteen days. 0:54:06.680 --> 0:54:09.600 Two weeks. You know, we can't like I've been wearing 0:54:09.600 --> 0:54:11.480 it around. You try it on. If it's not for you, 0:54:11.600 --> 0:54:13.360 you send the book. I think you know what we 0:54:13.520 --> 0:54:15.840 did with with the Hodinky Shop in twenty seventeen, we 0:54:15.920 --> 0:54:17.759 took I look, the brands that I hold in high 0:54:17.760 --> 0:54:18.279 regard are no. 0:54:18.360 --> 0:54:20.520 Surprises, and they're not unique to me. It's it's Apple, 0:54:20.560 --> 0:54:23.120 it's Nike. I mean, I wear air Maxes almost every day. 0:54:23.120 --> 0:54:24.799 If I if I like the air Maxes. 0:54:24.440 --> 0:54:25.560 I get those are good ones. 0:54:26.960 --> 0:54:27.120 You know. 0:54:27.280 --> 0:54:28.840 If I like the air Maxes that come in the 0:54:28.880 --> 0:54:30.440 mail to me, I keep them. If I don't, I 0:54:30.520 --> 0:54:32.080 send them back. I got my I got a refund 0:54:32.120 --> 0:54:33.800 in three days or five days. And that's fine. And 0:54:33.920 --> 0:54:37.080 so taking these very normal twenty fourst century e commerce 0:54:37.160 --> 0:54:40.440 practices and applying them to watches is not that crazy, 0:54:40.719 --> 0:54:42.759 but we were the first and still we remain one 0:54:42.800 --> 0:54:44.360 of the few who does it far fetch does it? 0:54:44.400 --> 0:54:46.279 Mister porter does it? Great etailers like that. 0:54:46.440 --> 0:54:49.080 You're you're out of far fetched. How did that experience 0:54:49.800 --> 0:54:50.840 translates to Hodenky. 0:54:50.960 --> 0:54:54.080 Yeah, it's interesting because I talked earlier about when I 0:54:54.160 --> 0:54:57.640 first encountered Hodinky. And you know, sometimes if you if 0:54:57.680 --> 0:54:59.600 you go away from a thing and you don't go 0:54:59.680 --> 0:55:01.359 back to for a while, and that was the case 0:55:01.400 --> 0:55:03.520 for me. I was really busy with my career. My 0:55:03.640 --> 0:55:05.720 wife and I were having three boys in three years, 0:55:05.800 --> 0:55:08.960 so we were pretty busy. I hadn't paid super close 0:55:08.960 --> 0:55:10.839 attention to everything that was going on in the world 0:55:10.880 --> 0:55:13.280 of hood Inky until it was contacted by a recruiter, 0:55:13.360 --> 0:55:16.360 until I got a chance to meet Ben, and I couldn't. 0:55:16.360 --> 0:55:18.279 I just couldn't believe how much had evolved at the 0:55:18.320 --> 0:55:20.279 business because in my mind it was still, yeah, the 0:55:20.480 --> 0:55:23.920 pre eminent watch blog, but I had no idea watch blog, 0:55:24.000 --> 0:55:27.120 yeah retail exactly, all the retail like, the way that 0:55:27.200 --> 0:55:29.480 the business set of all was enormous. Me the fact 0:55:29.480 --> 0:55:31.560 that it had launched its own insurance product, I mean, 0:55:31.600 --> 0:55:34.239 it was incredible and sort of I think what I 0:55:34.400 --> 0:55:36.920 saw was I had just spent almost six years at 0:55:36.960 --> 0:55:40.400 far Fetch starting when you know, the primary business of 0:55:40.440 --> 0:55:43.879 Farfetch was then and remains a marketplace, but so much 0:55:43.920 --> 0:55:46.120 it evolved at Farfetch as well. I mean, we had 0:55:47.280 --> 0:55:49.759 launched a platform services business which was taking all of 0:55:49.840 --> 0:55:52.600 the core technology and making it available for other retailers 0:55:52.640 --> 0:55:55.640 like Herod's and the likes. We had acquired a few businesses. 0:55:55.719 --> 0:55:58.160 I was involved in the acquisition of Stadium Goods, a 0:55:58.239 --> 0:56:01.040 pre owned sneaker marketplace. So just seeing kind of how 0:56:01.080 --> 0:56:03.800 that business has grown and evolved and I've kind of 0:56:03.840 --> 0:56:06.120 grown up in my career with it. I saw a 0:56:06.160 --> 0:56:08.600 lot of similarities with hodigiva'm on. It's a foundation of 0:56:08.800 --> 0:56:11.759 things that were there that one of our investors likes 0:56:11.800 --> 0:56:13.440 to say, are they close to maturity or are they 0:56:13.560 --> 0:56:16.880 like ten percent? And I'd say lovingly, they're closer to 0:56:17.000 --> 0:56:19.560 like ten percent, meaning like there's so much upside, there's 0:56:19.640 --> 0:56:22.319 so much still growth and evolution in front of us 0:56:22.400 --> 0:56:24.520 and in different ways that we can kind of push 0:56:24.560 --> 0:56:27.840 this business forward. And just being able to work alongside 0:56:27.880 --> 0:56:29.960 Ben as a founder of somebody who's who's I think 0:56:30.160 --> 0:56:32.800 truly one of the most influential people in this industry 0:56:33.800 --> 0:56:36.360 just was like an opportunity. I simply I would I 0:56:36.400 --> 0:56:38.920 would have never forgiven myself if I didn't go for it. 0:56:39.280 --> 0:56:41.520 Someonelmost told me that's the kind of sign of an entrepreneur. 0:56:41.560 --> 0:56:43.680 I've never been an entrepreneur to start my own business, 0:56:43.719 --> 0:56:44.960 but I had that feeling. 0:56:45.480 --> 0:56:47.680 You've worked at companies that are I don't want to 0:56:47.680 --> 0:56:51.000 call them startups, but not that you know, there's a 0:56:51.080 --> 0:56:55.640 difference between joining Amazon and eBay today and joining h Sure, 0:56:55.800 --> 0:56:58.359 joining eBay when it's two years old, and people like, hey, 0:56:58.440 --> 0:57:00.080 we don't know if this is gonna be Yeah, I 0:57:00.480 --> 0:57:02.759 think I'm probably the guy right behind the guy with 0:57:02.840 --> 0:57:03.760 the machete. 0:57:03.440 --> 0:57:04.719 Blazing a trail to the jump. 0:57:05.040 --> 0:57:07.359 I'm with him, but you know, he's got the He's 0:57:07.400 --> 0:57:09.480 the one who's been there instead of taken that sort 0:57:09.480 --> 0:57:13.040 of initial leap of faith. I mean, it's one thing 0:57:13.120 --> 0:57:14.640 that I think you always just have to like never 0:57:14.760 --> 0:57:16.840 take for granted in a business like Hudinki. And I 0:57:16.840 --> 0:57:18.600 think Ben did a good job with this very recently 0:57:18.640 --> 0:57:21.320 for an internal meeting, was just reminding people that this 0:57:21.520 --> 0:57:24.080 thing wasn't always a given, you know, And he went 0:57:24.160 --> 0:57:26.720 back to his original email inbox from two thousand and eight, 0:57:27.040 --> 0:57:29.160 to the first emails he sent from his inbox, and 0:57:29.240 --> 0:57:31.240 they weren't to collegues. They were to his family members. 0:57:31.280 --> 0:57:33.040 It's like, can you guys believe I'm getting paid to 0:57:33.120 --> 0:57:33.400 do this? 0:57:34.040 --> 0:57:37.240 Send five dollars? Truly, So Jeff's referring to a post 0:57:37.320 --> 0:57:38.880 that I was writing about watches. I was being paid 0:57:38.920 --> 0:57:40.840 seventy five dollars a post, truly. 0:57:40.920 --> 0:57:43.640 Then the first advertising contract, which was twelve months run 0:57:43.720 --> 0:57:46.480 of sight for a price that today might get you 0:57:46.600 --> 0:57:50.760 a day, it was twelve hundred dollars for the year. 0:57:51.080 --> 0:57:54.720 So those things, now you know that that's fifteen years ago. 0:57:54.760 --> 0:57:56.680 And again remember that the first part of the first 0:57:56.760 --> 0:57:59.760 decade of those fifteen years largely was spent just developing 0:57:59.800 --> 0:58:03.360 the most important editorial presence for the world of watches. 0:58:03.760 --> 0:58:05.560 I mean, I still think it is a startup, but 0:58:05.600 --> 0:58:07.640 it's a startup where there's again there's a trail that's 0:58:07.680 --> 0:58:09.560 been blazed. My role, the way I see it is 0:58:09.880 --> 0:58:12.200 really just to kind of, like I suppose, increase the 0:58:12.200 --> 0:58:14.960 speed and certainty of execution and really help it scale 0:58:15.040 --> 0:58:17.840 and build and sort to help us realize what we 0:58:17.960 --> 0:58:19.880 think is our fullest potential as a business. 0:58:20.240 --> 0:58:24.000 So let's stay with retail. I was going to ask 0:58:24.080 --> 0:58:28.040 you who your competitors are, but really, in terms of 0:58:28.200 --> 0:58:31.920 new nobody else is really selling very much online. Yeah. Look, 0:58:31.960 --> 0:58:34.360 I mean a handful of micro brands, but sure none 0:58:34.360 --> 0:58:35.919 of the bigs are selling to the level. 0:58:36.400 --> 0:58:38.280 Yeah, I mean, look there are a lot of and look, 0:58:38.440 --> 0:58:40.600 it's funny you say competitors like these are all our friends, 0:58:40.640 --> 0:58:42.240 Like we get coffees with them all the time. Watches 0:58:42.240 --> 0:58:44.560 in Switzerland and Torneo Booker, like these are great world 0:58:44.600 --> 0:58:46.560 class retailers. We have a lot like they do stuff 0:58:46.560 --> 0:58:47.720 that we can never do, and I think we do 0:58:47.760 --> 0:58:50.160 stuff that they could never do, you know, but there's 0:58:50.200 --> 0:58:52.360 nobody that competes with us directly in everything we do, 0:58:52.440 --> 0:58:55.080 and I think that's what makes us so so special. Frankly, 0:58:55.160 --> 0:58:57.160 Like this is a truly unique business, a piece unique, 0:58:57.160 --> 0:58:59.280 if you will. And you know, so many times over 0:58:59.280 --> 0:59:02.080 the years people said, was Houdinki the Warby Parker of watches? 0:59:02.120 --> 0:59:04.480 Which is not is it the Glossier of watches? It's 0:59:04.480 --> 0:59:06.840 none of that. It's something else entirely. And I think 0:59:06.920 --> 0:59:08.720 what the ambition is here is to become kind of 0:59:08.760 --> 0:59:12.120 really the global global leader of watches content and commerce, 0:59:12.160 --> 0:59:14.200 and like really b watches through six do we want 0:59:14.240 --> 0:59:15.920 to ensure your watches, we want to help you buy 0:59:16.000 --> 0:59:17.920 and sell them. We want to sell you straps. We 0:59:18.000 --> 0:59:21.000 want everything to exist in watches on Houdinki and we're 0:59:21.040 --> 0:59:23.040 getting there. And I think that's what's so exciting about it. 0:59:23.360 --> 0:59:26.240 And I think to Jeff's point, like I view really 0:59:26.320 --> 0:59:27.920 all brands as one or two things. Are either a 0:59:28.000 --> 0:59:30.000 challenger or you're an incumbent, right, And I think like 0:59:30.000 --> 0:59:32.200 a Torea, which is an amazing business, and one I've 0:59:32.200 --> 0:59:33.680 got a lot of love for it, like they're inn 0:59:33.680 --> 0:59:35.960 incumbent business. They've been around forever that they're now owned 0:59:35.960 --> 0:59:39.000 by Booker. We to some people are probably an incumbent, 0:59:39.080 --> 0:59:40.960 but we're not like this, as Jeff said this, I 0:59:41.040 --> 0:59:43.360 came from nothing. This business came from nothing. And the 0:59:43.440 --> 0:59:45.520 way that we view everything we do is from the 0:59:45.600 --> 0:59:47.439 mind of a challenger. We want to continue to push 0:59:47.480 --> 0:59:48.640 and continue to change things. 0:59:49.120 --> 0:59:52.040 Keep in mind the Internet runs in dog years, so 0:59:52.200 --> 0:59:55.800 you're an incumbent on the Internet. But when you look 0:59:55.840 --> 0:59:57.600 at some of the watch brands that have been around 0:59:57.680 --> 1:00:01.760 since the seventeenth century, eighteenth century, seventeen fifty five older 1:00:01.800 --> 1:00:06.040 than the country. Right, it's just absolutely so. So two 1:00:06.160 --> 1:00:09.920 thousand and eight, two thousand and nine young business in 1:00:10.040 --> 1:00:11.880 the internet, sort of middle aged. 1:00:12.000 --> 1:00:13.680 Yeah, and I want to be clear, like I so 1:00:14.000 --> 1:00:16.280 the business was an immediate platform with a little bit 1:00:16.360 --> 1:00:19.480 e commerce that was basically three people until twenty fifteen. 1:00:19.600 --> 1:00:21.560 Then we raised our first venture capital. We were probably 1:00:21.600 --> 1:00:23.200 ten twenty people, and now we're one hundred and thirty 1:00:23.280 --> 1:00:24.760 hundred and forty. So it's big or now that's a 1:00:24.800 --> 1:00:26.800 real business. It's a real business. But we're still not 1:00:27.240 --> 1:00:29.360 or know, we're still not Bloomberg. We're still not you know, 1:00:29.480 --> 1:00:31.520 something like that that is ubiquitous in a great way 1:00:32.160 --> 1:00:36.120 and really has the the kind of the certainty of 1:00:36.200 --> 1:00:38.360 its future. Like we want to to continue to push 1:00:38.440 --> 1:00:41.120 and challenge what the luxury watch industry and what all 1:00:41.240 --> 1:00:43.520 industries kind of think of when they think of retailers. 1:00:43.840 --> 1:00:45.800 We are a retailer. We are immedia platform. We're a 1:00:45.840 --> 1:00:48.760 community platform, we host events. We're an insurance product. We 1:00:48.840 --> 1:00:50.960 are a strapwear brand. We make things that say hood 1:00:50.960 --> 1:00:53.200 Inky on them. We are all these things and that's 1:00:53.240 --> 1:00:53.720 exciting to me. 1:00:53.880 --> 1:00:56.440 A couple more questions about retail before we move on, 1:00:57.320 --> 1:01:00.200 got to ask about Rolex getting into the certified your 1:01:00.240 --> 1:01:03.160 own business. What's that about? Where do you think that goes? 1:01:03.800 --> 1:01:06.640 I sort of use the analogy of like the world 1:01:06.680 --> 1:01:09.000 of automotive we talked about cars earlier. I mean, for me, 1:01:09.120 --> 1:01:11.800 it would be almost like impossible to think of a 1:01:11.880 --> 1:01:15.640 world where, you know, BMWU or Mercedes didn't offer a 1:01:15.720 --> 1:01:19.200 certified pren program under their own brand, under their own market. 1:01:19.240 --> 1:01:22.200 But let's break that take that apart a second. You 1:01:22.400 --> 1:01:25.400 go and buy you want to buy a used car, 1:01:25.600 --> 1:01:30.280 but you like the advantage of having the manufacturer tell 1:01:30.280 --> 1:01:31.800 you the cars in good shape and they're going to 1:01:31.840 --> 1:01:34.800 warranty it for you know, another three years and fifty 1:01:34.840 --> 1:01:37.240 thousand miles, so you're going to pay a little bit 1:01:37.280 --> 1:01:40.000 of a premium to pick up, especially if you're looking 1:01:40.000 --> 1:01:43.440 at an expensive car or complicated, you know, any of 1:01:43.480 --> 1:01:45.680 the more sophisticated vehicles out there. It's nice to have 1:01:45.840 --> 1:01:50.120 that backdrop when you're going out and buying a GMT 1:01:50.440 --> 1:01:54.080 from Rolex. Do you what does CPO do for you 1:01:54.880 --> 1:01:59.400 other than tell you have Rolex tell you we looked 1:01:59.440 --> 1:02:01.240 at this wat we cleaned it up here. 1:02:01.560 --> 1:02:04.120 I think for some people that's worth the premium, and 1:02:04.480 --> 1:02:06.720 at the moment, at least based on the evidence that 1:02:06.800 --> 1:02:09.760 we can we can observe. You know, where Rolex certified 1:02:09.800 --> 1:02:12.120 premium programs have already started to roll out is they 1:02:12.160 --> 1:02:14.680 are pricing it at a premium. The only way the 1:02:14.800 --> 1:02:17.840 premium to a premium, to a premium, to use a premium, 1:02:17.920 --> 1:02:20.200 to use the premium to the kind of market price 1:02:20.320 --> 1:02:22.560 a pre owned so a sub mariner which we were 1:02:22.560 --> 1:02:26.720 talking about earlier. You know, ten twelve thousand dollars watched retail, 1:02:28.400 --> 1:02:31.240 usually selling for the upper teens, maybe twenty thousand dollars 1:02:31.280 --> 1:02:33.919 in the preon market, you know, the Rollck certified preon 1:02:34.000 --> 1:02:36.000 prices are going to be even higher than that, maybe 1:02:36.040 --> 1:02:38.520 in the mid to upper twenties. And so for a 1:02:38.600 --> 1:02:41.320 certain buyer that maybe is peace of mind. Maybe it's 1:02:41.400 --> 1:02:43.600 the kind of knowledge of having bought it from a 1:02:43.720 --> 1:02:47.560 Rolex authorized dealer, certified by Rolex, making sure that it's 1:02:47.560 --> 1:02:51.120 only ever been serviced by Relux. And but again I 1:02:51.160 --> 1:02:54.200 think where the comparison still holds to a certified preon 1:02:54.280 --> 1:02:57.040 program is there's a finite number of places that sales 1:02:57.080 --> 1:02:59.360 certified preon and those are the brands themselves or the 1:02:59.360 --> 1:03:01.560 authorized dealer with the brands. There's tons of places that 1:03:01.680 --> 1:03:03.760 sell pre owned cars, and there are lots of places 1:03:03.800 --> 1:03:07.080 that sell pre owned watches. I think consumers have choices 1:03:07.120 --> 1:03:09.560 to go to a trusted player in a pre owned space, 1:03:09.920 --> 1:03:11.840 or maybe you know, go buy it off of eBay 1:03:11.960 --> 1:03:14.360 from the original owner. Take your chances. Maybe you get 1:03:14.360 --> 1:03:16.560 a lemon, maybe you get something in In our case, 1:03:16.560 --> 1:03:18.600 I mean, we're I think, as trusted as it gets. 1:03:18.680 --> 1:03:21.760 The trust is unimpeachable. Never you know, never sold the 1:03:21.840 --> 1:03:24.040 non authentic piece, never sold the piece that we couldn't 1:03:24.040 --> 1:03:26.680 stand behind and vouch for in a pre owned capacity. 1:03:27.080 --> 1:03:29.360 And to the points that we were discussing earlier, the 1:03:29.520 --> 1:03:32.200 ease of selling with us is unparalleled. I think the 1:03:32.280 --> 1:03:34.959 ability to sell and transact your sale of a watch 1:03:35.080 --> 1:03:37.320 over the internet, get an instant quote at an inserprise. 1:03:37.720 --> 1:03:39.600 The way the Certified pre Owned program is working at 1:03:39.600 --> 1:03:41.320 the moment is you have to physically take your watch 1:03:41.440 --> 1:03:45.120 into an authorized dealer that is offering the Rollick CPO program. 1:03:45.520 --> 1:03:48.760 They'll inspect your watch, they'll offer you something in exchange 1:03:48.760 --> 1:03:51.200 for your watch, And then I think, then this is 1:03:51.360 --> 1:03:53.400 you know, just my own personal views. Then they have 1:03:53.520 --> 1:03:57.000 the challenge of showing the original piece side by side 1:03:57.040 --> 1:03:58.800 with the pre owned piece, right, And there's something a 1:03:58.800 --> 1:04:01.760 little off there, right, If you're selling an original sub 1:04:01.800 --> 1:04:04.200 mariner for that ten twelve thousand dollars retail price and 1:04:04.280 --> 1:04:05.880 then the pre owned piece right next to it for 1:04:06.000 --> 1:04:09.200 twenty seven twenty eight thousand. Explaining that is a challenge. 1:04:09.440 --> 1:04:14.080 But my point being that like their entry into this market, 1:04:14.120 --> 1:04:16.400 if anything, just serves as an endorsement of the pre 1:04:16.480 --> 1:04:18.800 owned market. I think it's the biggest brand of the world. 1:04:18.880 --> 1:04:20.840 Whatever they do matters a hell of a lot in 1:04:20.920 --> 1:04:23.160 this space, and I think we look at that as 1:04:23.200 --> 1:04:25.280 a good thing. It's kind of a blessing, if you will, 1:04:25.800 --> 1:04:27.880 for the pre owned space and for the importance of 1:04:27.920 --> 1:04:29.960 the pre and space in the kind of constellation of 1:04:30.440 --> 1:04:33.400 you know, how people consume and transact with watches. 1:04:33.800 --> 1:04:34.000 Huh. 1:04:34.600 --> 1:04:37.160 So let's do a compare and contrast. I'm going to 1:04:37.680 --> 1:04:39.680 mangle his name, the CEO of. 1:04:40.000 --> 1:04:41.960 Paddock Here Here Star. 1:04:42.200 --> 1:04:49.920 Yeah. So he goes out and buys modern era Paddocks 1:04:50.240 --> 1:04:53.640 on the US market to figure out who's flipping them 1:04:53.760 --> 1:04:57.320 and to call a dealer two account, Hey, why are 1:04:57.320 --> 1:05:01.160 you selling our rare watches to somebody who's just flipping 1:05:01.200 --> 1:05:05.120 them on the secondary market. Can we assume we'll never 1:05:05.200 --> 1:05:07.000 see a CPO program from Paddock that? 1:05:07.120 --> 1:05:10.280 Well, actually, I think you guys actually reported that pretty recently, 1:05:10.400 --> 1:05:11.480 that that Thiery said that. 1:05:11.720 --> 1:05:14.280 That was an interview that one of the Bloomberg reporters 1:05:14.280 --> 1:05:16.000 who were at watching exactly right. 1:05:16.200 --> 1:05:18.440 So, I mean, as of today, it seems like they 1:05:18.480 --> 1:05:21.160 will not get into CPO, and that is not surprising 1:05:21.200 --> 1:05:21.360 to me. 1:05:21.480 --> 1:05:23.800 Really, all the volume, it makes much more sense. 1:05:23.880 --> 1:05:26.120 Yeah, but exactly the ticket price is so much higher 1:05:26.680 --> 1:05:29.240 with Rolex in particular, I think it's important you could. 1:05:29.080 --> 1:05:34.400 Get in to a Calatrava relatively get it twenty five probably, Yeah, 1:05:34.440 --> 1:05:36.520 oh really if you can get it, Oh, that's much 1:05:36.600 --> 1:05:37.960 more than they were just a few year. 1:05:38.040 --> 1:05:40.920 Yeah, and again you can't you can't find them at retail. 1:05:41.040 --> 1:05:42.840 They're they're so more demand than supply. 1:05:43.080 --> 1:05:46.120 Yeah, but yeah, Rolex is a different thing. And I 1:05:46.240 --> 1:05:48.400 want to be totally concise here, So like when when 1:05:48.520 --> 1:05:50.960 we say Rolex CPO, like the dealers are mostly going 1:05:51.040 --> 1:05:53.760 to be doing this stuff, and the dealers set the prices. 1:05:53.800 --> 1:05:55.040 It's not like Rolex set the prices. 1:05:55.240 --> 1:05:58.000 So what's in it for Rolex versus you know, what's 1:05:58.040 --> 1:06:00.280 in it for the dealers, because there's only so much apply. 1:06:01.040 --> 1:06:05.320 I went to an event out in at the Manhassan Americana, 1:06:06.080 --> 1:06:10.640 at the big watch place over there. I'm I believe 1:06:10.720 --> 1:06:16.760 that's correct, and they have they're pushing everything except ap 1:06:17.080 --> 1:06:21.120 Rolex and Paddock. Because you want to get on their 1:06:21.360 --> 1:06:22.480 their good side. 1:06:22.320 --> 1:06:23.400 Buy some of these watches. 1:06:23.480 --> 1:06:25.760 I mean, it's they don't come out and say it, 1:06:25.880 --> 1:06:28.840 but it's wink wink, nudge, nudge. Hey, if you wanna 1:06:29.040 --> 1:06:31.200 if you want a Batman, you need to buy one 1:06:31.240 --> 1:06:35.800 of these Pistachio Brightling premieres, and then we could talk about, 1:06:36.000 --> 1:06:38.800 you know, a batgirl on a jubilee. 1:06:38.840 --> 1:06:40.360 If that that's what gets you excited. 1:06:41.520 --> 1:06:43.360 How did we ever end up in this place? 1:06:44.480 --> 1:06:46.760 Well, I mean it's it's the uniformity of taste at 1:06:46.800 --> 1:06:48.360 this point. And I'm gonna blame it on Instagram, my 1:06:48.400 --> 1:06:50.280 friends at Instagram. You know, it's just so many people 1:06:50.680 --> 1:06:53.040 posting the same stuff over and over again. And five 1:06:53.120 --> 1:06:55.160 years ago, nobody cared about the Nautilus or the Aquanat. 1:06:55.160 --> 1:06:56.880 I mean, they were good watches and we all liked them, 1:06:56.920 --> 1:06:58.840 but It wasn't a big deal at all, and people 1:06:58.920 --> 1:07:00.480 were buying what they like. And then all of a 1:07:00.520 --> 1:07:02.600 sudden people say, wait a minute, I can I can 1:07:02.640 --> 1:07:04.240 buy a p A tech at twenty and sell it 1:07:04.320 --> 1:07:06.680 for sixty, sell it for one hundred and sixty, which 1:07:06.680 --> 1:07:09.120 the Nautilus was trading at first, really fifty seven eleven A. 1:07:09.680 --> 1:07:11.920 And so that that changed the dynamic completely. It used 1:07:11.920 --> 1:07:13.160 to just be like, hey, I like this thing, I'm 1:07:13.160 --> 1:07:14.600 going to buy it. I may make money, I may not. 1:07:15.120 --> 1:07:17.400 Then it became if you're not making money, you're a fool. 1:07:17.760 --> 1:07:19.440 And that's whole a lot of people in finance. 1:07:19.560 --> 1:07:21.120 Is it just five years ago? 1:07:21.280 --> 1:07:22.800 Is it that reason? I would say, I would say 1:07:22.840 --> 1:07:25.400 pre COVID, Before COVID, it was not a concern. It 1:07:25.480 --> 1:07:28.040 really wasn't. Okay, Daytona, you knew you'd get that an 1:07:28.080 --> 1:07:30.360 awkward I'm sorry, Nautilust maybe you'd get that, but it 1:07:30.480 --> 1:07:32.919 wasn't that way. I mean. I bought my fifty seven 1:07:32.920 --> 1:07:36.200 eleven R from Tiffany here in New York in twenty thirteen. 1:07:36.240 --> 1:07:38.840 Tiffany Blue No no, No, this is a rose could one. 1:07:39.040 --> 1:07:41.400 One before the blue one, and they it was sitting 1:07:41.400 --> 1:07:43.480 in the case, and that's it and there I'll take that. 1:07:43.720 --> 1:07:45.919 And that watch at its peak was probably four hundred 1:07:45.920 --> 1:07:48.200 thousand dollars. Yeah, I probably bought it. Would you pay 1:07:48.240 --> 1:07:49.560 forty five something like that? 1:07:49.720 --> 1:07:51.960 Ten X is not a bad exactly, but that's a 1:07:52.160 --> 1:07:56.160 change left ubs. Yeah, this is where So here's the 1:07:56.280 --> 1:07:59.880 crazy thing. I have slowly warmed up to the north. 1:08:00.360 --> 1:08:03.200 It's not my favorite watch. I don't some of the 1:08:03.320 --> 1:08:09.040 design I don't. I don't get the Royal Oak. I 1:08:09.160 --> 1:08:11.760 know people who are like have eight of them. I 1:08:12.160 --> 1:08:14.800 just can't wrap my head around. And I know I 1:08:15.080 --> 1:08:17.440 understand the historical significance. 1:08:18.560 --> 1:08:20.160 What what makes the Royal. 1:08:19.960 --> 1:08:25.240 Oak and the noaut you So, first of all, I'm 1:08:25.400 --> 1:08:28.040 ten years older than both you guys. So I remember 1:08:28.120 --> 1:08:32.400 the seventies as a horrific decade of all around hollester 1:08:32.560 --> 1:08:35.519 and disco. Right, that's the seventies to me, and the 1:08:35.840 --> 1:08:40.439 design ethos. By the way, I have a very contemporary house. 1:08:40.520 --> 1:08:43.240 I love mid century modern. So if you go back 1:08:43.360 --> 1:08:45.680 to the some of the designs of the I was 1:08:45.960 --> 1:08:52.200 just in Scottsdale, Arizona, at the Valley Hoe Hotel that 1:08:53.000 --> 1:08:55.800 like the rat pack should be washing it. Just that 1:08:56.040 --> 1:09:00.400 sort of design ethos it it's before I was born, 1:09:00.520 --> 1:09:03.160 But I'm like, I get it. But I remember the 1:09:03.240 --> 1:09:07.360 seventies as just like a horrific era. Maybe it's the 1:09:07.360 --> 1:09:09.479 same thing as the Samarana. I just associate it with. 1:09:09.880 --> 1:09:11.760 So I look at the Royal Oak and I'm like, yeah, 1:09:11.760 --> 1:09:14.960 it's got that kind of Remember the giant Porsche Carrera 1:09:15.120 --> 1:09:15.719 glass shirt. 1:09:16.280 --> 1:09:17.519 They were horrific And. 1:09:19.479 --> 1:09:25.240 I know the historical significance what makes the watch so special? 1:09:25.400 --> 1:09:27.479 Well, And the first of all, it was my first 1:09:27.640 --> 1:09:29.439 high end watch. I bought two roll exes and then 1:09:29.479 --> 1:09:31.519 after that I saved up when I bought a Vinta 1:09:31.640 --> 1:09:33.920 JP and a Series Royal Oak. This is probably twenty 1:09:34.439 --> 1:09:37.200 What year was the watch nineteen seventy two? It was okay, series, 1:09:37.320 --> 1:09:39.840 the first really early one, and box paper is the 1:09:39.840 --> 1:09:42.560 whole thing. And it first of all, it was the 1:09:42.720 --> 1:09:45.200 AP was the first high end manufacturer ever visited. So 1:09:45.320 --> 1:09:47.960 that opened up my eyes to what watchmaking could be, 1:09:48.680 --> 1:09:50.559 if that makes any sense. Yeah, yeah, to see how 1:09:50.560 --> 1:09:53.000 a Royal Oak is finished, polished the case, you mean, 1:09:53.640 --> 1:09:55.439 not a boutique. You went to the mids Switzerland. 1:09:56.000 --> 1:09:57.840 Really we should all get such a trip. 1:09:57.920 --> 1:09:59.800 It was amazing honestly do that. 1:10:00.080 --> 1:10:02.240 I know guys that go to Modena and do the 1:10:02.280 --> 1:10:05.559 Ferrari exactly and they come back and they say, whatever 1:10:06.080 --> 1:10:07.479 on the car wasn't enough. 1:10:07.720 --> 1:10:10.160 I'm gonna yeah, so precisely that. I know someone with 1:10:10.439 --> 1:10:11.120 a five point. 1:10:10.920 --> 1:10:13.560 Fifty just came back and bought a fourth thirty. 1:10:13.320 --> 1:10:16.599 Coues he could. Yeah, it's it's that experience, you see 1:10:16.640 --> 1:10:18.120 what it really goes into the stuff and you fall 1:10:18.160 --> 1:10:20.919 in love. And then the royal look in particular the jumbos, 1:10:20.920 --> 1:10:23.800 the thirty nine millimeter watches wear some that's hilarious, that's 1:10:23.800 --> 1:10:26.479 what they're called. Yeah, they wear so amazingly on your wrist, 1:10:26.600 --> 1:10:28.639 and it's just it really, it is just I think 1:10:28.720 --> 1:10:30.720 like the chicest, most elegant watch a man or a 1:10:30.760 --> 1:10:31.360 woman can wear. 1:10:31.840 --> 1:10:33.680 I mean I've loved them forever. I bought one as 1:10:33.720 --> 1:10:35.240 recently as a month ago, two months ago. 1:10:36.320 --> 1:10:37.880 It's just an amazing thing. And then all of a 1:10:37.920 --> 1:10:40.519 sudden they're actually cool. And I think ten years ago 1:10:40.760 --> 1:10:42.439 they were not cool, and that was kind of fun. 1:10:42.880 --> 1:10:44.400 But it's a lot more fun when they are cool 1:10:44.439 --> 1:10:46.280 and people know what they are, and people are excited 1:10:46.280 --> 1:10:48.040 to see a royal oak on your wrist. And then 1:10:48.040 --> 1:10:50.120 you got like our friend John Mayer who's very close 1:10:50.200 --> 1:10:52.519 with them, and Ed Sheeran and Kevin Hart, all these 1:10:52.560 --> 1:10:55.000 like kind of cool interesting people started to get kind 1:10:55.000 --> 1:10:56.800 of hip to the royal oak thing. And now it's fun. 1:10:56.840 --> 1:10:58.400 It's part of like a cultural phenomenon. 1:10:58.439 --> 1:11:00.519 Well, I love the idea that if you know, you know, 1:11:00.760 --> 1:11:04.000 meaning so I could I could wear any of my 1:11:04.280 --> 1:11:08.240 eclectic watches or the langa. Nobody says a word, but 1:11:08.400 --> 1:11:11.280 every now and then someone at like some event will 1:11:11.280 --> 1:11:13.439 come up and say, is that the moon face? 1:11:13.760 --> 1:11:15.840 Yeah? If anybody knows what that long it is, that's 1:11:15.880 --> 1:11:16.519 a very good sign. 1:11:16.680 --> 1:11:18.680 Yeah, because then they're like, oh, this guy, that's the 1:11:18.760 --> 1:11:21.960 real stuff. This guy's plugged into what's going on in 1:11:22.120 --> 1:11:24.600 that space. And it's not just a matter of you 1:11:24.680 --> 1:11:25.840 have money, you could go out and buy the most 1:11:25.880 --> 1:11:30.120 expensive car. It's you're picking something very very specific. So 1:11:31.360 --> 1:11:33.560 so one of the people here has this nautalis he 1:11:33.640 --> 1:11:36.479 sat on his wrist for thirty years, and it's the 1:11:37.160 --> 1:11:40.680 blue leather band and the blue face and it's not 1:11:40.880 --> 1:11:44.360 the full chrono, but it has the offset second hand 1:11:44.479 --> 1:11:47.680 calendar and I've kind of warmed up to it. Is 1:11:48.160 --> 1:11:50.320 the Every time I see it, I'm like, I just 1:11:50.479 --> 1:11:52.880 appreciate it a little more. Yeah, and I didn't feel 1:11:52.920 --> 1:11:54.840 that way when I first spotted that. 1:11:56.160 --> 1:11:58.280 The natalist in the and I'm sorry keep saying awkward. 1:11:58.439 --> 1:12:01.040 Not a lot notalists and Roy. Look, if I may say, 1:12:01.120 --> 1:12:03.640 I think they belong on bracelets. They were conceived on 1:12:03.680 --> 1:12:06.320 bracelets by drill genta. So ones on strap I've often 1:12:06.479 --> 1:12:09.400 I haven't had a super strong affinity towards, but those 1:12:09.439 --> 1:12:12.479 on bracelets I think are just fantastic. They're not They're 1:12:12.479 --> 1:12:14.280 not a rolllex like. You're not taking them swimming, you're 1:12:14.280 --> 1:12:16.360 not taking them diving. You can't go chopping wood in them. 1:12:16.400 --> 1:12:17.280 You know, Jeff and I both live. 1:12:17.240 --> 1:12:19.240 Well, you shouldn't chop wood in any so you shouldn't. 1:12:19.240 --> 1:12:21.400 But sometimes I learned the hard way. Again, I can't 1:12:21.400 --> 1:12:24.360 even throw a ball with this. That's how I the 1:12:24.439 --> 1:12:25.120 rehired meal. 1:12:25.160 --> 1:12:27.240 I always the result. I would just go back to 1:12:27.280 --> 1:12:28.400 the resharch, go straight. 1:12:28.200 --> 1:12:30.200 Off at half a million dollars when you're acting. So 1:12:30.439 --> 1:12:33.080 so as long as we're talking about specific watches, what 1:12:33.200 --> 1:12:36.000 are some of your favorites and what are your grail watches? 1:12:36.080 --> 1:12:39.280 That man, you haven't gotten, but you would love to have. 1:12:39.560 --> 1:12:42.479 Yeah, I mean my favorite, my favorite watch is the Omega. 1:12:42.520 --> 1:12:44.800 My grandfather gave me. No surprise there, that's the one. 1:12:45.000 --> 1:12:45.479 As I said, I. 1:12:45.479 --> 1:12:48.920 Put clearly a family emotional connection question, and all these 1:12:48.960 --> 1:12:52.680 watches have an emotional component outside of something like that. 1:12:52.800 --> 1:12:55.400 Outside of something like that. Look the Moonwatch, the hand 1:12:55.479 --> 1:12:57.280 one Moonwatch for seven thousand bucks. You can buy it 1:12:57.320 --> 1:12:59.720 on Hoodinky all day. Get it is the best watch 1:12:59.760 --> 1:13:01.000 in the world for that kind of well with the 1:13:01.040 --> 1:13:03.759 speed Mast Speedmaster, so my speedy. 1:13:03.840 --> 1:13:06.080 I just refused to get the hechs Alike because I 1:13:06.160 --> 1:13:09.479 know I the beauty of Rolex and I just had 1:13:09.560 --> 1:13:12.479 this after almost twenty years, fifteen years. I just had 1:13:12.520 --> 1:13:17.479 this repolish because I destroyed this watch. It's actually tight 1:13:17.520 --> 1:13:18.519 since they repolished it. 1:13:18.920 --> 1:13:21.000 But I this is a. 1:13:22.600 --> 1:13:27.040 Platinum yacht Master and I bought this in eight from 1:13:27.120 --> 1:13:30.080 a mortgage broker that was just liquidating everything. So that's 1:13:30.200 --> 1:13:33.640 my as I'm writing bail Out Nation, I buy this 1:13:33.760 --> 1:13:38.160 watch from a mortgage broker, So that's my emotional But 1:13:38.439 --> 1:13:40.280 you know, you could beat the crap out of these. 1:13:40.920 --> 1:13:43.479 The same thing with the Speedmaster, but the hex Al 1:13:43.560 --> 1:13:46.559 I was terrified about So I got this. I paid 1:13:46.640 --> 1:13:47.880 up for the Sapphire. 1:13:47.680 --> 1:13:47.960 Got it. 1:13:49.840 --> 1:13:53.240 Because you know, when I smash it into something, I 1:13:53.240 --> 1:13:55.479 don't have to worry about a dent, a dent scratch 1:13:55.600 --> 1:14:00.840 or whatever. So that's a great entry level sub ten 1:14:00.920 --> 1:14:01.719 thousand dollars watch. 1:14:01.760 --> 1:14:04.160 It's both an entry level and exit level, if that 1:14:04.200 --> 1:14:06.200 makes any sense. Like some of the wealthiest guys I 1:14:06.280 --> 1:14:08.280 know that have owned every paddock, every long but whatever, 1:14:08.439 --> 1:14:10.160 they end up wearing a handwab moon Watch. And I 1:14:10.240 --> 1:14:12.760 guarantee you when I retire from you know whatever, this is, 1:14:12.920 --> 1:14:15.040 that's the watch I will wear every day Handwab. 1:14:14.760 --> 1:14:18.559 Lie So when I wear so my two sub ten 1:14:18.640 --> 1:14:21.519 thousand dollar watches that I wear pretty regularly. One is 1:14:21.640 --> 1:14:24.920 the Monica with the gray face from Tag. The other 1:14:25.080 --> 1:14:27.639 is a Speedmaster, And every now and then someone will 1:14:27.680 --> 1:14:30.800 say I go speedy. Yeah, yeah, And it's just like 1:14:31.640 --> 1:14:33.200 you know, if you know, you know sort of thing 1:14:33.400 --> 1:14:36.320 it is. So let's take how about you, Jeff, what 1:14:36.360 --> 1:14:38.160 are you wearing sub ten Yeah? 1:14:38.200 --> 1:14:41.280 I mean my so my two sentimental favorite watches again 1:14:41.400 --> 1:14:44.080 both have a connection to my my family, and one 1:14:44.160 --> 1:14:46.879 is my great grandfather's pocket watch. It has his initials 1:14:46.960 --> 1:14:49.680 instead of the numbers. So it's Jay Virgil Allen and 1:14:49.800 --> 1:14:52.360 we named our third son Virgil after my great grandfather. 1:14:52.760 --> 1:14:55.120 This's got his name on it. A beautiful one hundred 1:14:55.120 --> 1:14:57.880 and twenty year old American mad pocket watch. And then 1:14:57.920 --> 1:14:59.960 I have my father Saeko, which you wore every day, 1:15:00.160 --> 1:15:03.160 and it's a quartz siko on a on an elastic strap, 1:15:03.200 --> 1:15:05.960 a little bit like this one bracelet. I should say, uh, 1:15:06.120 --> 1:15:08.120 this is a hood Inky limited edition I'm wearing today. 1:15:08.200 --> 1:15:10.560 This was under two hundred dollars, even under ten. That 1:15:10.600 --> 1:15:13.479 was under two hundred dollars time X collaboration we did, 1:15:14.000 --> 1:15:15.960 and I love it because of that that that's sort 1:15:16.000 --> 1:15:18.360 of you can't see. It's a pretty bulletproof. Yeah, I mean, 1:15:18.400 --> 1:15:20.599 this is this This I literally don't have to think 1:15:20.640 --> 1:15:22.640 twice to put it on my wrist. I wear I 1:15:23.320 --> 1:15:24.800 Ben knows. I'm on a quest to kind of get 1:15:24.800 --> 1:15:27.959 as many hood Inky limited edition watches as I'm happy. 1:15:27.760 --> 1:15:28.040 To help with. 1:15:28.320 --> 1:15:31.840 Yeah, yeah, yeah, it feels like it special to me 1:15:32.000 --> 1:15:33.960 to kind of own a little piece of our history 1:15:34.000 --> 1:15:36.360 as a brand. And again we've done limited editions with 1:15:36.400 --> 1:15:38.560 everyone from time X and Cassio, g Shock all the 1:15:38.600 --> 1:15:41.880 way up to Vastron and you know crazy independent brands 1:15:41.920 --> 1:15:44.679 like Grunfeld and and and and Lauren Ferrier and others 1:15:44.800 --> 1:15:48.400 like that. I guess my, yeah, this this, this is 1:15:48.600 --> 1:15:52.240 like one that I'm wearing a lot currently, but not 1:15:52.400 --> 1:15:54.559 to copycat. But I love the will make a speed 1:15:54.600 --> 1:15:56.920 Master And again the hood Inky limited Edition speed Master 1:15:57.040 --> 1:15:57.680 is a personal thing. 1:15:57.920 --> 1:16:03.080 It was anniversary with the Snoopy. Yeah, that's a great 1:16:03.160 --> 1:16:05.560 little watch, although that's kind of going ballistic. 1:16:05.240 --> 1:16:10.680 And price also. Yeah, so if you go to YouTube. 1:16:10.280 --> 1:16:13.640 You can find the old sixties and seventies zero commercials 1:16:14.200 --> 1:16:16.519 for time X takes a looking and keeps on together. 1:16:16.720 --> 1:16:18.680 I remember they would strap it to a front of 1:16:18.760 --> 1:16:21.680 a boat with a bunch of navy seals out and 1:16:21.760 --> 1:16:23.880 the boat would be slapping the water and they'd pull 1:16:23.960 --> 1:16:27.400 the watch out and still still going. They were great commercials, 1:16:27.760 --> 1:16:30.600 and the washes last forever. So fun fact, did you 1:16:30.680 --> 1:16:33.800 know that the very first television commercial ever aired ever 1:16:34.040 --> 1:16:35.519 worldwide was a watch brand? 1:16:35.840 --> 1:16:36.920 And what was all of us? 1:16:37.080 --> 1:16:39.479 Oh, no, nineteen forty one. I want to say, during 1:16:39.760 --> 1:16:41.800 the World Series game or something like that. Nineteen forty 1:16:41.800 --> 1:16:43.920 one was nine seconds. It cost them nine dollars. 1:16:44.920 --> 1:16:48.360 That's unbelievable. So let's let's take a step up above 1:16:48.560 --> 1:16:52.400 ten grandy, what would you guys look at. I'll give 1:16:52.439 --> 1:16:55.360 you a budget ten to fifties, so easy for me. 1:16:55.439 --> 1:16:57.840 And we talked earlier about like, you know, you saw 1:16:57.880 --> 1:16:59.840 a watch, you fell in love with it. On this 1:17:00.320 --> 1:17:01.880 you decided not to pull the trigger, and then you 1:17:01.960 --> 1:17:04.519 regret it every singce it kind of got away from you. 1:17:04.640 --> 1:17:06.320 For me, it's actually it is a Lunga one, but 1:17:06.360 --> 1:17:08.439 it is a special series of long ones they did. 1:17:08.720 --> 1:17:11.479 Called the Swarre series. Swarre dial. It's a mother of 1:17:11.560 --> 1:17:14.920 pearl dial and it's this one in particular. Phillips had 1:17:14.960 --> 1:17:18.320 it in their watch auction last November. Bend, myself and 1:17:18.360 --> 1:17:21.200 another collie of ours were at the Phillips headquarters in Geneva, 1:17:21.680 --> 1:17:24.760 saw the watch before it was under the hammer, loved it, 1:17:25.000 --> 1:17:27.400 just everything what to look go for. I want to 1:17:27.400 --> 1:17:29.360 say it only went for about well only went for 1:17:29.920 --> 1:17:32.519 thirty five or forty thousand Swiss francs. So it's definitely 1:17:32.560 --> 1:17:34.960 within the budget you've just given this. But and again 1:17:35.200 --> 1:17:38.439 Lunga ones, there aren't this is not a ubiquitous product. 1:17:38.439 --> 1:17:40.040 There aren't that many of them. It's one of those 1:17:40.080 --> 1:17:42.840 if you know, you know, I love the aesthetics of 1:17:42.880 --> 1:17:44.760 the dial. I love everything about the Lunga brand, but 1:17:44.880 --> 1:17:47.760 like this one in particular, this the dial just totally CAPTU. 1:17:47.840 --> 1:17:49.240 I would look at it and I would just get 1:17:49.320 --> 1:17:51.000 lost in the dial every time i'd wear it. 1:17:51.439 --> 1:17:54.479 I Oh, so, so you didn't pull the trick, didn't 1:17:54.479 --> 1:17:55.000 pull the trigger? 1:17:55.120 --> 1:17:55.519 How about you? 1:17:55.680 --> 1:17:57.360 What what got away? Uh? 1:17:57.840 --> 1:18:02.000 Well, the stuff that has gotten away is generally a 1:18:02.040 --> 1:18:03.120 little bit higher end stuff. 1:18:03.200 --> 1:18:05.240 So I have one of those that I've never even 1:18:05.320 --> 1:18:08.800 thought about pulling the trigger on, and recently, well I'm 1:18:08.840 --> 1:18:11.760 asking you the question. But so before we get to 1:18:11.840 --> 1:18:14.920 the crazy higher end stuff, you know, under one hundred 1:18:15.040 --> 1:18:17.160 over ten, Yeah, what would you wear? 1:18:17.479 --> 1:18:19.920 Weirdly, the watch that like I really kind of hated 1:18:19.960 --> 1:18:21.360 when it came out, now I love and I'm just 1:18:21.400 --> 1:18:23.320 never pulled the trigger. As the platinum Daytona, I'm a 1:18:23.400 --> 1:18:26.720 hardcore Daytona guy. I'm with you. I just never I was. 1:18:26.800 --> 1:18:29.360 I was actually witch color combination. So the platinum one 1:18:29.479 --> 1:18:32.240 is only the ice blue with the brick the brown ceramic. 1:18:32.600 --> 1:18:35.479 Do you do you like the new I love the back, 1:18:36.200 --> 1:18:38.720 but I kind of like the face of the older one. 1:18:38.800 --> 1:18:40.960 Interesting like if I could mix those two. Yeah, I 1:18:41.320 --> 1:18:45.559 prefer the new one, honestly, and I may it's great. 1:18:46.280 --> 1:18:49.200 That one I really disliked in twenty thirteen Minut launch, 1:18:49.360 --> 1:18:51.559 mostly because I was sour. I was sour that they 1:18:51.600 --> 1:18:53.840 didn't give us the steel watch with a ceramic bezzel. 1:18:53.960 --> 1:18:55.400 That was the big thing that that came out in 1:18:55.400 --> 1:18:58.680 twenty sixteen. Got that, So that's to watch. I'm just 1:18:58.760 --> 1:19:01.680 like weirdly never owned, which is strange because I love 1:19:01.720 --> 1:19:03.759 platinum watches. I love Rolex and I love the Daytona. 1:19:03.800 --> 1:19:04.479 I just never did it. 1:19:04.960 --> 1:19:08.000 And now you know, we'll see that's really can I 1:19:08.080 --> 1:19:11.360 tell you that blue brown and again dating back to 1:19:11.439 --> 1:19:14.160 the fifty sixties sort of fashion. So my wife used 1:19:14.200 --> 1:19:17.400 to teach fashion illustration and design. She's a colorist, and 1:19:17.720 --> 1:19:19.840 you show her that light blue with the brown, and 1:19:19.920 --> 1:19:24.439 she's like, wildly underrated, perfect combinations. People miss it. And 1:19:24.680 --> 1:19:28.400 when that came out with the display case, I mean, 1:19:28.479 --> 1:19:29.519 what what can you say? 1:19:29.720 --> 1:19:32.680 Yeah, I mean it's look, it's an eighty thousand dollars chronograph. 1:19:33.200 --> 1:19:35.120 So at that level, your little price, well, look you're 1:19:35.160 --> 1:19:36.680 intil You can buy a Langa, you can buy a 1:19:36.720 --> 1:19:38.160 Pat Tack you can buy a lot of stuff for 1:19:38.200 --> 1:19:40.160 eighty dollard bucks. You get the platinum bracelet, which is 1:19:40.200 --> 1:19:44.160 expensive for sure. So it's it's a I've got a 1:19:44.240 --> 1:19:46.240 I've got a complex relationship with that watch. 1:19:46.920 --> 1:19:51.000 So let's let's talk rail watches regardless of price. What's 1:19:51.080 --> 1:19:53.400 the one that's out there that that is the killer 1:19:53.439 --> 1:19:53.640 for you? 1:19:53.800 --> 1:19:55.679 There's a there's a few, I mean there are several. Really, 1:19:55.680 --> 1:19:57.880 you wouldn't be surprised to learn a thirty four to 1:19:57.880 --> 1:20:00.880 forty eight Paddock, which is their first self winding perpetual calendar, 1:20:01.080 --> 1:20:03.679 in particular in white gold. Those were kind of trading 1:20:03.680 --> 1:20:05.679 in like the mid two hundreds for a long while. Gold. 1:20:05.760 --> 1:20:06.759 What's the face collar? 1:20:06.880 --> 1:20:07.280 It's silver? 1:20:07.439 --> 1:20:09.479 Kind of all right, because they've run the they've done 1:20:09.520 --> 1:20:10.720 the salmon, they've done the watch. 1:20:10.760 --> 1:20:13.280 So this is way earlier. This is nineteen sixties, nineteen 1:20:13.280 --> 1:20:15.800 seventy oh really, yeah, So the very first ones, those 1:20:15.880 --> 1:20:18.360 were trading the mid twies forever. The minute I could 1:20:18.360 --> 1:20:19.920 afford one, I kind of hamm them hot. And now 1:20:19.920 --> 1:20:21.559 they're trading for about eight hundred two million. 1:20:21.680 --> 1:20:24.040 So as a Daytona guy, what do you think of 1:20:24.280 --> 1:20:28.479 like the Newman Daytona's in the sixties era. They're not crazy. 1:20:28.560 --> 1:20:31.320 They're like, for the same seventy five, you could get 1:20:31.360 --> 1:20:32.960 a nineteen sixty nine. 1:20:32.960 --> 1:20:37.280 Yeah, sixty three nine. I've had many of those. I've 1:20:37.320 --> 1:20:40.320 had a bunch of Paul Newman. So no, no, it's 1:20:40.439 --> 1:20:42.760 not a Grail watch. Look a sixty to sixty three 1:20:42.840 --> 1:20:45.560 Mark one Oyster Paul Newman, which is kind of like 1:20:45.600 --> 1:20:47.840 the big bad Paul Newman. I had one of those. 1:20:47.920 --> 1:20:49.720 I sold it too soon. Wish I still had that. 1:20:49.800 --> 1:20:51.720 But a gold Paul Newman I've never had that. That'd 1:20:51.760 --> 1:20:53.800 be something fun. But these are crazy watches, you know, 1:20:54.400 --> 1:20:56.639 I mean really expensive watches that I like. I don't. 1:20:56.680 --> 1:20:59.040 I don't live in Manhattan anymore. I live upstate. Those 1:20:59.120 --> 1:21:00.920 just don't fit my life all anymore. When I lived 1:21:00.920 --> 1:21:02.439 in Manhattan and it was kind of out and about, 1:21:02.479 --> 1:21:04.280 it kind of made sense. But now, as a father 1:21:04.400 --> 1:21:06.800 in particular, it just doesn't compute this terrible for chopping 1:21:06.840 --> 1:21:09.240 would yeah, you know, it always goes back to chop 1:21:09.400 --> 1:21:11.920 riding my canoe, you know, things like that. So what 1:21:12.040 --> 1:21:15.559 T Grail watched? Jeff? Money is no object? It would 1:21:15.680 --> 1:21:15.960 it would? 1:21:16.360 --> 1:21:20.080 I think I'd go with a watch that comes from 1:21:20.400 --> 1:21:23.080 a craftsman from a craftsman's hand. So I probably a 1:21:23.240 --> 1:21:26.280 Roger Smith or Philipe du four, you know, knowing that 1:21:26.400 --> 1:21:28.679 I do own a piece of art from an artist, 1:21:28.880 --> 1:21:32.160 somebody who individually made this piece by hand, put a 1:21:32.200 --> 1:21:37.000 stamp on it, saw it from birth to basically like conception. 1:21:37.200 --> 1:21:39.240 I mean, yeah, that that that would be it for me. 1:21:40.320 --> 1:21:43.400 And again I think Philipe dufour is turning seventy five, 1:21:43.640 --> 1:21:47.120 not getting it oneah, and he's still making every part 1:21:47.160 --> 1:21:49.479 of the component, every piece by hand. Roger Smith, you know, 1:21:49.640 --> 1:21:53.920 kind of next generation. But yeah, Reshap, these guys who 1:21:54.000 --> 1:21:58.200 are making these watches, just you know, it's incredible what 1:21:58.280 --> 1:22:00.200 they do. It's a it's a one man operation start 1:22:00.240 --> 1:22:02.000 to finish, and I just think like something like that. 1:22:02.800 --> 1:22:05.960 It's yeah, it's like you're buying twenty watches exactly. 1:22:06.080 --> 1:22:07.040 It'd be like you're. 1:22:06.880 --> 1:22:09.640 Buying an original picassa from the man himself while he 1:22:09.760 --> 1:22:10.400 was still painting. 1:22:10.600 --> 1:22:12.760 Like and you know that Roger in particular, and I'm 1:22:12.840 --> 1:22:15.400 lucky enough to own one. I've known him forever. His 1:22:15.520 --> 1:22:17.880 story is amazing. He makes ten watches per year, Roger Smith, 1:22:18.200 --> 1:22:20.360 all by hand. He does not own one of his 1:22:20.439 --> 1:22:24.000 own watches never has because we can't give up ten 1:22:24.040 --> 1:22:26.320 percent of you know, he can't take one watch out 1:22:26.320 --> 1:22:28.360 of the line of ten per year, you know. And 1:22:28.479 --> 1:22:31.320 these watches are phenomenally expensive that you know, new and 1:22:31.360 --> 1:22:34.080 they're there worth even more kind of secondhand. But his watches, 1:22:34.080 --> 1:22:36.160 as Jeff said, are just to me. It's the ten game. 1:22:36.200 --> 1:22:38.519 It's a great story on Hood of Geek today about 1:22:38.720 --> 1:22:43.040 his second pocket watch, which there's a whole backstory to it. 1:22:43.240 --> 1:22:45.640 Basically was he made a pocket watch and presented it 1:22:45.720 --> 1:22:49.479 to his master, George Daniels, and George Daniels rejected it 1:22:49.520 --> 1:22:51.960 and said to go back and work on another version 1:22:52.040 --> 1:22:55.320 and do it better. Took him five years of his 1:22:55.600 --> 1:22:59.200 entire life livelihood creating a second pocket watch, And then 1:22:59.560 --> 1:23:03.200 Georgia said, did you make every part by hand? He said, yes, congratulations, 1:23:03.240 --> 1:23:06.200 Now you're a watchmaker. He then sold that pocket watch 1:23:06.240 --> 1:23:09.320 to a private buyer to fund the creation of his 1:23:09.479 --> 1:23:11.600 next series of watches. And that watch is going to 1:23:11.600 --> 1:23:14.960 be auctioned by Phillips and I imagine kinds of records. 1:23:15.240 --> 1:23:18.080 Oh yeah, easily, for sure. I mean his wristwatches, like 1:23:18.200 --> 1:23:19.479 just generic risk watches now. 1:23:19.400 --> 1:23:22.120 Trade for about six His generic wrist watches if you 1:23:22.160 --> 1:23:26.160 can find one. I mean, Jacobs and Co. What do 1:23:26.240 --> 1:23:27.120 you do with stuff like that? 1:23:27.200 --> 1:23:28.439 There are half a million, a million. 1:23:28.560 --> 1:23:29.200 It's a different thing. 1:23:29.280 --> 1:23:31.920 He did that out thing that went for thirty million 1:23:32.840 --> 1:23:35.040 rights like these are just insane numbers. 1:23:35.280 --> 1:23:37.120 It's a different corner of the market. It's a very 1:23:37.160 --> 1:23:39.880 real corner, a really trade for sure. You know, he 1:23:40.160 --> 1:23:43.519 he tends to, he designs it, he does the setting 1:23:43.680 --> 1:23:46.960 and all the stone work. But the movement is a jeweler. Look, 1:23:46.960 --> 1:23:49.400 he's Jacob, Jacob the jeweler. He's the guy in all 1:23:49.400 --> 1:23:52.960 the rap songs. Literally, So it's a different corner of 1:23:52.960 --> 1:23:54.519 the market, but a very real one. And like you know, 1:23:54.560 --> 1:23:57.120 he is selling those watches for crazy numbers all day. 1:23:57.520 --> 1:23:58.360 Huh amazing. 1:23:58.560 --> 1:24:02.599 Yeah, so so let's talk a little bit about talking watches. 1:24:03.120 --> 1:24:06.719 This has become a super popular segment of Oh Dinky, 1:24:07.360 --> 1:24:09.960 I know the first one was with John Mayer. 1:24:10.280 --> 1:24:12.679 How did this get started? Yeah, so kind of taking 1:24:12.720 --> 1:24:14.960 a step back in twenty twelve, when I launched Straps 1:24:15.400 --> 1:24:17.599 online to sell straps, I got an email that said, 1:24:17.640 --> 1:24:19.920 Hey John Mayer here, love what you're doing. Let's hop 1:24:19.960 --> 1:24:21.519 on the phone. And I was like, Okay, like, I 1:24:21.560 --> 1:24:23.360 wonder who this is, some guy named John Mayor, you know, 1:24:23.600 --> 1:24:26.040 some accountant in Texas named John Mayer. So got on 1:24:26.080 --> 1:24:27.840 the phone. Turns out of John Mayer, the rock star, 1:24:28.000 --> 1:24:29.760 and we just became kind of fast friends. You know, 1:24:29.840 --> 1:24:32.240 we were about the same age at the time. We 1:24:32.320 --> 1:24:34.519 were both living a really weird life. Mine was on 1:24:34.600 --> 1:24:36.960 the road, traveling around for watches, take pictures, writing. He 1:24:37.240 --> 1:24:40.519 was an actual rock star, and we just became like true, true, 1:24:40.720 --> 1:24:43.839 very close friends, very quickly. And so in twenty thirteen 1:24:44.120 --> 1:24:45.679 he called me and he's like, Hey, I'm in town 1:24:45.800 --> 1:24:48.120 doing Letterman or Leno or something like that. I've got 1:24:48.160 --> 1:24:49.560 a bag full of watches. Do you want to just 1:24:49.640 --> 1:24:52.639 like record a conversation about watches? And I said sure, 1:24:52.720 --> 1:24:56.400 and we had wait. So this was Mayor's doing his idea. 1:24:56.479 --> 1:24:58.599 I mean, we'd always talked about doing a video together 1:24:58.760 --> 1:25:02.439 some kind, but never premeditated, never storyboarded or anything like that. 1:25:02.600 --> 1:25:04.479 And I've got a bag full of watches. Sounds like 1:25:04.560 --> 1:25:05.160 he just knocked. 1:25:07.640 --> 1:25:09.200 He used to roll pretty heavy with stuff, not so 1:25:09.320 --> 1:25:11.800 much anymore, just for security reasons, but you know, to 1:25:12.040 --> 1:25:15.240 to to our credit, like the first really the second 1:25:15.280 --> 1:25:18.160 person we ever hired at Hodinki was a full time videographer. 1:25:18.520 --> 1:25:20.200 So I said, who I went to Columbia with Will? 1:25:20.200 --> 1:25:21.720 Who's still with us? I said, actually, I got a 1:25:21.800 --> 1:25:23.920 video guy right here, and so we went. We were 1:25:24.000 --> 1:25:25.760 on Verick Street. We went over to a place called 1:25:25.760 --> 1:25:27.600 Little Prince, which is a little cafe there on the 1:25:27.640 --> 1:25:30.680 Spring or Prince rather and uh. And we walked in 1:25:30.760 --> 1:25:32.280 and we said, hey, I got John Mayer coming here 1:25:32.280 --> 1:25:33.960 in twenty minutes. Can we shoot? And they were like, sure, 1:25:34.000 --> 1:25:35.560 we're not open yet. We don't really care, you know, 1:25:36.000 --> 1:25:38.479 And so we shot for an hour, one camera, one 1:25:38.560 --> 1:25:41.000 never man, and we just talked about watches, no makeup, 1:25:41.080 --> 1:25:44.160 no anything, no, you know. His assistant wasn't there, and 1:25:44.240 --> 1:25:46.479 it just became Internet magic in a bottle, as things 1:25:46.800 --> 1:25:48.320 can happen, you know, can do well. 1:25:48.320 --> 1:25:51.000 It was very authentic. Here's a guy who's who's a 1:25:51.120 --> 1:25:55.680 rock and roll star. Yeah, this generation's Eric Clapton, singer, songwriter, 1:25:55.880 --> 1:25:59.519 guitarist touring with the Dead Post Jerry. 1:25:59.680 --> 1:25:59.840 Yeah. 1:26:00.120 --> 1:26:03.280 And if you find out there's a whole nother dimension 1:26:03.360 --> 1:26:05.240 to him, is he's really into watching. 1:26:05.320 --> 1:26:06.840 Oh you you really have no idea? 1:26:06.960 --> 1:26:10.800 So when you record this, you have any idea. 1:26:10.880 --> 1:26:11.720 This is going to blow up. 1:26:11.800 --> 1:26:13.720 Now. Look whereas you're doing you're thinking, oh, this is 1:26:13.800 --> 1:26:14.360 great stuff. 1:26:14.400 --> 1:26:18.000 It's John is an amazing person. He's the most well spoken, 1:26:18.080 --> 1:26:21.200 most creative, oddist thinker of anybody Herman. I say that lovingly, 1:26:21.320 --> 1:26:23.080 like he's just got a different mind than the rest 1:26:23.120 --> 1:26:26.040 of us, truly. And you know, we were recording it, 1:26:26.080 --> 1:26:27.839 We're like, okay, like this is going to be special 1:26:28.080 --> 1:26:30.200 for us. But like there's a little watch blog. Three 1:26:30.240 --> 1:26:32.560 guys sitting in a we work, you know, sure, and 1:26:32.800 --> 1:26:34.920 uh we put her online and it blows up, I 1:26:35.000 --> 1:26:37.120 mean just explodes. And then from there J. J. Reddick 1:26:37.160 --> 1:26:38.880 basketball player who was a friend of mine at the 1:26:38.920 --> 1:26:40.880 time as well still is and said, oh, like I 1:26:40.920 --> 1:26:43.040 would do that. He was into watches. And then John Goldberger, 1:26:43.160 --> 1:26:45.000 this great collector, and then as he's I'm sorry, and 1:26:45.080 --> 1:26:47.559 Jack Nicholas and you know insert. It has just been 1:26:47.680 --> 1:26:48.920 a run of celebrities. 1:26:49.080 --> 1:26:55.200 Most recently I saw Kevin hartny six, Tobias Harris, I 1:26:55.360 --> 1:26:57.760 just saw that was really kind of yesterday Kermit the Frog. 1:26:57.920 --> 1:26:59.080 That was what I was going to say. Yesterday we 1:26:59.080 --> 1:27:01.160 had Kermit the Frog, who I think Trump's everybody. 1:27:00.920 --> 1:27:01.080 Ye. 1:27:02.640 --> 1:27:03.120 Celebrity. 1:27:03.240 --> 1:27:05.200 I can't say I've ever spotted a time piece on 1:27:05.320 --> 1:27:07.560 his off free and wrists exactly. 1:27:08.800 --> 1:27:09.080 To get them. 1:27:09.160 --> 1:27:13.040 Especially so there is a Kermit watch from Warrist that 1:27:13.520 --> 1:27:15.000 and he's out promoting exactly. 1:27:15.080 --> 1:27:15.840 Yeah, so it was part of that. 1:27:16.000 --> 1:27:18.080 So the first of every month instead of a one 1:27:18.160 --> 1:27:21.920 showing a Kermit. So so as long as we're talking 1:27:21.920 --> 1:27:25.920 about it, that was shown it Watches and Wonders twenty 1:27:26.000 --> 1:27:26.519 twenty three. 1:27:27.320 --> 1:27:28.760 What did you guys see? What'd you like? 1:27:28.880 --> 1:27:29.840 Would you think of? Uh? 1:27:30.200 --> 1:27:30.840 What took place? 1:27:30.960 --> 1:27:32.960 I mean, I'll say this, this is my second TI 1:27:32.960 --> 1:27:34.720 I'm going to watch his Wonders. I had been to 1:27:34.800 --> 1:27:39.280 previous iterations of watch shows Bazzle World and Siah. Watches 1:27:39.320 --> 1:27:41.680 and Wonders kind of was the mash up, if you 1:27:41.720 --> 1:27:45.640 will have. Bazzle World and Siah went in dormant for 1:27:45.720 --> 1:27:47.600 few years of course because of COVID. Came back in 1:27:47.680 --> 1:27:49.920 twenty twenty two, and I think it came back with 1:27:50.040 --> 1:27:52.040 a bang. It was almost like this pent up energy, 1:27:52.520 --> 1:27:55.920 pent up, like just this big release of actual release 1:27:56.000 --> 1:27:58.719 of tons and tons of watches and some really incredible watches. 1:27:59.200 --> 1:28:02.120 I think two through there were some standout watches for sure, 1:28:02.560 --> 1:28:05.600 probably less across the board just wow affect than there 1:28:05.680 --> 1:28:07.439 wasn't twenty twenty two. I think some of that was 1:28:07.520 --> 1:28:11.040 that again builds up post pandemic. I mean for me 1:28:11.160 --> 1:28:13.360 and I will say this, and he's sitting here right 1:28:13.400 --> 1:28:14.720 next to me, not trying to blow a smoke, but 1:28:14.800 --> 1:28:16.400 like for me, one of the most special things was 1:28:16.640 --> 1:28:19.160 getting a chance to walk around with Ben. I'd been 1:28:19.200 --> 1:28:20.599 working with him at that point for a little over 1:28:20.640 --> 1:28:23.519 a year. A year prior I was in my third 1:28:23.600 --> 1:28:25.560 week and he had just had his first child, so 1:28:25.640 --> 1:28:27.400 he wasn't able to attend. He was at home with 1:28:27.479 --> 1:28:30.120 the baby. But walking around with him was really special 1:28:30.160 --> 1:28:35.200 because you see a lot of people who instantly recognize 1:28:35.200 --> 1:28:37.439 Ben come off to him. These guys, well, they say, 1:28:37.840 --> 1:28:40.080 they're like, you're the guy with Kermit the Frog. Now 1:28:40.160 --> 1:28:43.160 they say some version of the reason I'm in the 1:28:43.240 --> 1:28:45.320 industry is because of you, or the reason I fell 1:28:45.360 --> 1:28:48.080 in love with a category is because of you. And 1:28:48.200 --> 1:28:51.519 that's I said something to someone later that week, because 1:28:51.560 --> 1:28:54.920 eventually it rubs off on you. I have this association 1:28:55.439 --> 1:28:58.400 with Hodinki now simply by being an employee of the brand. 1:28:58.479 --> 1:29:00.479 For the last year, we host a kind of a 1:29:00.560 --> 1:29:03.800 community meet up event on the Thursday, the last night 1:29:03.880 --> 1:29:06.560 that many of us were in town, and we just 1:29:06.680 --> 1:29:09.719 did an open invite RSVP through the website through Hodinky, 1:29:09.840 --> 1:29:11.760 so anybody who was in town was welcome to join. 1:29:12.400 --> 1:29:15.320 And I must have had a dozen people at least 1:29:15.439 --> 1:29:18.040 saying thank you to me. And I thought, I've never 1:29:18.120 --> 1:29:20.240 had never worked for a brand or a business, and 1:29:20.280 --> 1:29:22.799 I worked for some great brands, I mean Cardier, Louisvistan 1:29:22.880 --> 1:29:24.519 tac Quire. Never had someone come up to me and 1:29:24.560 --> 1:29:27.320 say thank you, and again, credit to this guy who 1:29:27.360 --> 1:29:30.479 started it all that that's the impact he's had, that's 1:29:30.520 --> 1:29:33.000 the effect he's had, and that's the effect Hodinky has 1:29:33.080 --> 1:29:35.080 had as a manifestation of all that Ben's you know, 1:29:35.320 --> 1:29:37.519 created to this point. And now I get to sort 1:29:37.520 --> 1:29:39.280 of be a part of that, to be, you know, 1:29:39.439 --> 1:29:43.439 part of in some ways like serving this broader watch 1:29:43.479 --> 1:29:48.240 community and helping to kind of continue to further curiosity, knowledge, passion, enthusiasm, 1:29:48.320 --> 1:29:50.720 and and it's it's really a wonderful feeling for someone 1:29:50.760 --> 1:29:51.800 to come up to you just be like, thank you 1:29:51.880 --> 1:29:52.559 for all that you're doing. 1:29:52.640 --> 1:29:52.800 Huh. 1:29:52.960 --> 1:29:55.200 And we don't take that for granted. I don't take 1:29:55.240 --> 1:29:57.720 that for granted, certainly. I just think that's a really special. 1:29:57.560 --> 1:30:01.000 Yeah, that's a rare what struck you at Watches and 1:30:01.080 --> 1:30:03.120 Wonders Besides the Oris kerrment. 1:30:03.400 --> 1:30:05.000 The Oris kerment was a fun one and I think, 1:30:05.040 --> 1:30:07.160 you know, echoing what Jeff said, it was my first 1:30:07.200 --> 1:30:09.680 time there because a my daughter was born last year 1:30:09.680 --> 1:30:11.200 and then COVID so three years, so it's been four 1:30:11.320 --> 1:30:12.760 years since I was in Swiss. You've gone to the 1:30:12.800 --> 1:30:15.639 ones before, oh for fifteen twenty years. Yeah, So getting 1:30:15.680 --> 1:30:18.559 back there and seeing people still appreciate what we're still doing. 1:30:18.600 --> 1:30:20.200 I've been doing this for fifteen years. This is not 1:30:20.360 --> 1:30:22.840 like a two year old startup. So exciting to feel 1:30:22.840 --> 1:30:26.200 that energy and that appreciation. Again, definitely in person. But 1:30:26.360 --> 1:30:28.760 in terms of product, look, Langa, we've talked about a lot. 1:30:28.920 --> 1:30:30.519 They make some of the best watches on Earth. They 1:30:30.560 --> 1:30:32.800 introduced one watch and they're only doing one hundred of them, 1:30:32.960 --> 1:30:35.639 which is crazy. Odysseus Chronograph, It's one hundred and fifty 1:30:35.640 --> 1:30:36.519 thousand dollars saying. 1:30:36.439 --> 1:30:40.000 So flex to launch one that is a flex and 1:30:40.320 --> 1:30:42.679 ps gone girl hated. 1:30:43.160 --> 1:30:44.639 I mean, you couldn't even never hit. 1:30:44.600 --> 1:30:45.360 It, never hit the shot. 1:30:45.400 --> 1:30:49.439 But by the way, you mentioned the the blue and 1:30:49.880 --> 1:30:54.960 brown Daytona, which came out any other new watches. I mean, 1:30:55.000 --> 1:30:58.800 I understand the entire Tutor thing blew up. I'm not 1:30:58.920 --> 1:31:02.679 a giant Tutor fan. They just feel like they're lesser. Rolexes. Well, 1:31:02.760 --> 1:31:04.240 I know that's blasphemy to say. 1:31:04.640 --> 1:31:07.040 I mean, look, it's it's not blasphemy, but I understand it. 1:31:07.160 --> 1:31:08.280 I haven't a love Tutors. 1:31:08.280 --> 1:31:13.000 I think at don't have the same proportions. They just 1:31:13.240 --> 1:31:14.439 feel like they're. 1:31:16.120 --> 1:31:19.840 And I do it too. I tried to. I really was, 1:31:20.160 --> 1:31:22.800 went in to buy put them on, and it just 1:31:23.040 --> 1:31:24.600 kind of you gotta buy what you like, you know. 1:31:25.439 --> 1:31:27.920 But they had a pretty strong year. Rolex has a 1:31:27.960 --> 1:31:31.280 new titanium watch, the Hot Master in titanium. I really 1:31:31.400 --> 1:31:33.599 like that. That's cool that. I like that more than 1:31:33.640 --> 1:31:36.240 I thought that I would. It's big but lightweight. Patech 1:31:36.360 --> 1:31:40.040 had a new travel time watch. So wait, you brought 1:31:40.120 --> 1:31:43.120 this up? Is it possible that? How is it possible? 1:31:43.280 --> 1:31:47.400 Protect Philip has not introduced a brand new watch in 1:31:47.560 --> 1:31:48.479 twenty four years? 1:31:48.680 --> 1:31:51.280 How is that humanly possible? Well, I mean that's a 1:31:51.320 --> 1:31:53.360 little bit of parsing of word. They're a little bit 1:31:53.400 --> 1:31:53.559 and so. 1:31:53.600 --> 1:31:56.200 They're always doing variation. Yeah, so this is a new 1:31:56.320 --> 1:32:00.479 model line, brand new. What other industry could go two 1:32:00.600 --> 1:32:03.760 decades plus and not introduce a new anything. 1:32:04.040 --> 1:32:06.439 You know, Portia, I mean they haven't. I mean, I 1:32:06.479 --> 1:32:06.960 guess they did. 1:32:07.000 --> 1:32:11.439 The Taykan, well, the Tykan, the Panamara is fifteen years old. 1:32:12.640 --> 1:32:16.439 The Macan is twelve years old that they've remember. It 1:32:16.560 --> 1:32:19.000 was blasphemy for them to roll out in suv of 1:32:19.040 --> 1:32:20.360 course fifteen years ago. 1:32:22.160 --> 1:32:24.160 But I mean again, I mean, so like the Tykan, 1:32:24.320 --> 1:32:27.000 I'm sorry, the Cayenne was two was the year two thousand, right, 1:32:27.080 --> 1:32:29.479 so that's twenty three years ago. The Taikan, which is 1:32:29.479 --> 1:32:31.559 the electric car, was probably what six years ago? Five? 1:32:31.800 --> 1:32:33.240 You know, I think it's less than that. 1:32:33.320 --> 1:32:33.559 Okay. 1:32:33.640 --> 1:32:36.120 It's like Paul McCartney, right, he hasn't released an album 1:32:36.200 --> 1:32:37.840 in thirty years, but he can sell out. 1:32:37.680 --> 1:32:38.080 To read it. 1:32:38.320 --> 1:32:40.439 But if you're a Beetle, right, if you're one of 1:32:40.520 --> 1:32:43.479 the two surviving Beatles, you can probably the tech is 1:32:43.560 --> 1:32:47.599 the tech and I guess that's the parallel. So, since 1:32:47.720 --> 1:32:49.680 since we're talking about cars and I know you have 1:32:49.800 --> 1:32:54.559 to run soon, you spent the pandemic rebuilding three thirty GP. 1:32:55.160 --> 1:32:57.760 A slight, A slight exaggeration of my role in that. 1:32:58.479 --> 1:33:00.800 So I was I was working with somebody that was 1:33:00.840 --> 1:33:02.600 helping to do it, So I wasn't rebuilding. This was 1:33:02.880 --> 1:33:06.040 literally barn find a garage find it. They call her 1:33:06.120 --> 1:33:08.000 barn find but it was in a garage in Rome. 1:33:08.560 --> 1:33:11.479 That's all original, all original, untouched. It was on Bloomberg 1:33:11.520 --> 1:33:13.840 a few weeks ago. My friend Hannah wrote that story. 1:33:14.400 --> 1:33:16.040 So he's been a guest here a couple of times, 1:33:17.560 --> 1:33:20.360 so she was actually I actually visited her and Magnus 1:33:20.520 --> 1:33:22.559 in their shop in La It's. 1:33:23.320 --> 1:33:26.559 So tying it all together. Hannah was actually my editor 1:33:26.600 --> 1:33:29.839 at one of my very first freelance jobs for Forbes exactly, 1:33:29.920 --> 1:33:33.000 but not for watches. She was editing a literary blog, 1:33:33.040 --> 1:33:35.679 like a book blog. I was writing for that unpaid. 1:33:35.880 --> 1:33:38.639 Oh that's crazy, but I just wanted I wanted to buy. Yeah, 1:33:39.560 --> 1:33:41.960 so she's amazing. But yeah, So I'm really in the cars, 1:33:42.000 --> 1:33:44.600 and I spent a little bit of time and a 1:33:44.640 --> 1:33:47.400 lot of money doing that during during COVID. But that's 1:33:47.439 --> 1:33:50.080 what I'm into. I'm intofying these things that have direct 1:33:50.080 --> 1:33:52.479 connections with interesting people and keeping them going. 1:33:52.560 --> 1:33:54.200 What other cars are you playing with? 1:33:56.160 --> 1:33:58.800 I've got drive an E thirty nine five almost every day, 1:34:00.240 --> 1:34:00.760 so I know. 1:34:00.920 --> 1:34:04.519 The spe convertible six. I the last year they made 1:34:04.960 --> 1:34:07.240 the sticks and I couldn't find it. I had to 1:34:07.439 --> 1:34:10.200 fly out to Indianapolis test drive it, and then my 1:34:10.280 --> 1:34:11.400 wife and I drove it home. 1:34:11.479 --> 1:34:11.880 That's fun. 1:34:11.960 --> 1:34:14.040 Stopping off at Falling Water is the first day they 1:34:14.040 --> 1:34:14.800 were open for the season. 1:34:14.800 --> 1:34:16.840 I'm not kidding. I did that in a GT three touring. 1:34:16.920 --> 1:34:18.920 I stopped off at Falling Water. Yeah, truly. 1:34:19.520 --> 1:34:21.680 I have a client that has a GT three that 1:34:22.080 --> 1:34:25.000 he wanted to sell, and the dealer said, give to us. 1:34:25.040 --> 1:34:28.280 We'll take a twenty percent consignment. I'm like, we know 1:34:28.360 --> 1:34:30.439 people that bring a trailer, let me list it for you. 1:34:30.600 --> 1:34:32.880 So that's what we're That's that's really funny. GT three 1:34:33.000 --> 1:34:33.439 stick Ship. 1:34:33.920 --> 1:34:36.960 It was the touring right, no wing, but the stick, 1:34:37.000 --> 1:34:40.479 which is now becoming increasingly rare. We were there the 1:34:40.560 --> 1:34:43.160 first day it was open, and I'm driving this six 1:34:43.320 --> 1:34:46.840 hundred horsepower monster and there's like a light dusting of snow, 1:34:47.240 --> 1:34:50.680 so I am like feathering the throttle because with just 1:34:50.840 --> 1:34:54.080 the slightest touch you're going sidew so but it was 1:34:54.160 --> 1:34:56.439 spect what a spectacular place. 1:34:56.720 --> 1:34:58.040 It really is. Nowhere it really is. 1:34:58.479 --> 1:35:03.280 It's amazing in into Porscha's you know, stuff here and there, 1:35:03.840 --> 1:35:08.040 so a little blasphemy. I have two nine to eleven's. 1:35:08.080 --> 1:35:10.960 One I'm keeping stock. That's a cabrio. By the way, 1:35:12.000 --> 1:35:14.439 before they went crazy, I picked these up for pennies 1:35:15.200 --> 1:35:19.080 and I have so the eighty seven is in a cabrio. 1:35:19.320 --> 1:35:21.320 The I'm sorry, the eighty eight is a cabrio. The 1:35:21.400 --> 1:35:24.720 eighty seven is a three hundred thousand mile car that 1:35:25.120 --> 1:35:29.439 I'm pulling the engine and the transmission out, dropping Tesla 1:35:29.560 --> 1:35:33.120 motor and completely kidder a nine to eleven E with 1:35:33.479 --> 1:35:35.320 Moment Motors in Austin. 1:35:35.439 --> 1:35:36.360 That's cool. 1:35:36.439 --> 1:35:39.679 And I've been on the weight so all these guys 1:35:39.720 --> 1:35:42.080 are booked a year, Yeah, Valley, I've been on the 1:35:42.120 --> 1:35:45.120 wait list for almost a year. It goes down to Texas. 1:35:45.560 --> 1:35:49.040 By the time this broadcast, it should be in Texas 1:35:49.520 --> 1:35:53.439 getting a heart transplant. And that's kind of a funny. 1:35:53.960 --> 1:35:55.120 And by the time I'm done, I. 1:35:55.600 --> 1:35:57.519 Would have been able to walk into a dealer and 1:35:57.600 --> 1:36:00.080 say give me that nine to eleven for what this 1:36:00.120 --> 1:36:03.320 will ends up costing. But it'll be the only electric 1:36:03.479 --> 1:36:06.080 nine to eleven in New York by the time It's 1:36:06.160 --> 1:36:09.320 done super cool. So if you're a BMW and a 1:36:09.360 --> 1:36:13.920 Porsche fan, I feel your your your taste. The one 1:36:14.000 --> 1:36:16.639 thing I have to ask in terms of Grail watches, 1:36:17.439 --> 1:36:21.000 so the and I'm not just a longa person, but 1:36:22.000 --> 1:36:24.560 the and I am going to mangle the pronunciation. The 1:36:26.439 --> 1:36:29.880 hand work best stuns anork s guns step tourbiyon. Yeah, 1:36:30.080 --> 1:36:33.759 that just has the numbers and that sort of carved. 1:36:33.920 --> 1:36:37.320 Yeah. The aperture at six, Yeah, what the hell does 1:36:37.400 --> 1:36:37.760 that thing go? 1:36:37.880 --> 1:36:37.920 For? 1:36:38.120 --> 1:36:38.519 The stage? 1:36:38.560 --> 1:36:40.960 You, by the way, complete you can't see them anywhere. 1:36:41.280 --> 1:36:43.960 If I saw one was somewhere at auction I found 1:36:44.000 --> 1:36:48.679 out about afterwards, I would I would ballpark three hundred, okay, yeah, 1:36:49.479 --> 1:36:52.000 and that was eighty ninety when it came out. 1:36:52.439 --> 1:36:54.960 Probably more. I mean if I know a website that 1:36:55.000 --> 1:36:56.360 would probably be able to tell you. I think we 1:36:56.479 --> 1:36:57.600 covered it. I know we covered it. 1:36:57.640 --> 1:36:59.600 When I came out a buck and change, Yeah, I 1:36:59.600 --> 1:37:02.439 would get one forty oh so it's only double. 1:37:03.160 --> 1:37:05.720 But those are those are the airs thin in that world. 1:37:05.760 --> 1:37:07.840 Like I saw one of those go for about two 1:37:07.920 --> 1:37:11.479 hundred about a year ago. And again I'm still wrestling 1:37:11.520 --> 1:37:14.200 with a thirty forty thousand I'll watch two hundred is 1:37:14.360 --> 1:37:15.519 like next level. 1:37:15.760 --> 1:37:18.120 Yeah, it's just I mean, it's just said earlier, really 1:37:18.160 --> 1:37:20.719 earliest in this in this session, like it's just applying 1:37:20.760 --> 1:37:22.560 to man, there's a lot more guys that want a 1:37:22.600 --> 1:37:24.720 Nautilus or an aquanat yeah, because they know what it is, 1:37:24.800 --> 1:37:27.639 or Daytona. Nobody's ever heard of a Handrick skin turbion 1:37:27.680 --> 1:37:29.519 from longag even if it is that much. 1:37:29.600 --> 1:37:32.320 Oh my god, that could be the like if I 1:37:32.400 --> 1:37:33.640 have a rail watch, that's it. 1:37:34.200 --> 1:37:36.519 And once I do that, then I just you know, 1:37:36.640 --> 1:37:39.519 you've done it. Probably not where do you go from that? 1:37:39.880 --> 1:37:40.200 I mean that. 1:37:40.560 --> 1:37:43.719 So that's listen, that's the same problem with the Grand 1:37:43.840 --> 1:37:47.600 Longo one. Where do you go from there? It just 1:37:47.760 --> 1:37:51.920 you just struck going full OCD and backfilling and it's crazy. 1:37:52.080 --> 1:37:54.160 So I have a bone to pick with you guys. 1:37:54.960 --> 1:37:57.479 I'm speaking at some event in Aspen. It was the 1:37:57.760 --> 1:38:00.680 International Luxury real Estate and I've been about real estate 1:38:00.760 --> 1:38:04.600 my whole career. So they invited me, and you know, 1:38:04.760 --> 1:38:07.280 they say, get there a day or so early because 1:38:07.439 --> 1:38:10.240 the altitude is you know, you don't want to stand up. 1:38:10.280 --> 1:38:13.320 And if you've been to Vail, it's the same sort 1:38:13.360 --> 1:38:14.920 of thing sor right, I get there, I get a 1:38:15.000 --> 1:38:18.720 day to kill and I go into Aspen and what 1:38:18.920 --> 1:38:21.640 is this a Langan Zone shop? So I go in 1:38:21.960 --> 1:38:25.000 and I see the Langa one, which is their famous 1:38:25.080 --> 1:38:29.639 nineteen ninety four watch that's asymmetrical, which was a radical 1:38:29.720 --> 1:38:33.599 departure from Marches, and I think there's just like March April. 1:38:34.280 --> 1:38:38.439 And I get back home and I don't know if 1:38:38.479 --> 1:38:41.280 you've ever experienced this. You see a watch and it 1:38:41.439 --> 1:38:45.120 just starts to haunt you again. Yes, right, we're talking 1:38:45.120 --> 1:38:47.320 about Yeah, I'm thinking about it. I'm thinking about it. 1:38:47.439 --> 1:38:49.839 I have a big round birthday coming up in October, 1:38:50.320 --> 1:38:52.760 and so I make an appointment to go into the 1:38:52.840 --> 1:38:57.160 Langa boutique in New York and I try on the 1:38:57.240 --> 1:39:00.400 longer one and look, I'm not a little guy mill 1:39:01.200 --> 1:39:02.240 What is this a toy? 1:39:02.760 --> 1:39:05.960 I need a real watch. And so the woman says, oh, 1:39:06.040 --> 1:39:09.400 we have the grand Langa one, sure, and I try on. 1:39:10.960 --> 1:39:13.560 It wasn't the one I fell in love with, and 1:39:13.640 --> 1:39:16.000 it wasn't the one I ultimately really wanted. 1:39:16.080 --> 1:39:17.320 But have a bone to pick with you. 1:39:18.200 --> 1:39:21.640 It was it was a Grand Langa but without the 1:39:21.760 --> 1:39:25.720 moonface and that sort of chocolate, silver gray. I don't 1:39:25.720 --> 1:39:30.200 even know how to describe the color. Sure, And so 1:39:30.400 --> 1:39:33.080 I start looking around and looking around, and now I 1:39:33.320 --> 1:39:37.759 find I find the Saxonia with the moonface black watch 1:39:37.960 --> 1:39:41.000 pink face, and I'm waiting on I'm trying to decide 1:39:41.040 --> 1:39:43.960 if I want that, And then I see the platinum 1:39:45.080 --> 1:39:46.960 Grand Langa one. What is that? 1:39:47.120 --> 1:39:49.599 Forty one and a half something like that? Yeah, exactly, 1:39:49.840 --> 1:39:53.320 and and it's on you. 1:39:53.479 --> 1:39:58.000 It's sixty six new but new papers box on Hodinky 1:39:58.120 --> 1:40:00.960 forty two, and I'm trying really hard to wrap my 1:40:00.960 --> 1:40:01.800 head around forty two. 1:40:01.800 --> 1:40:03.519 It's a lot of money for a watch, yeah, and 1:40:03.680 --> 1:40:04.040 I can. 1:40:04.000 --> 1:40:06.320 Afford it, but it's it's just a lot of money. 1:40:06.800 --> 1:40:08.200 So I make the decision. 1:40:08.479 --> 1:40:09.040 I don't remember. 1:40:09.040 --> 1:40:10.920 It was like the end of August or the end 1:40:10.960 --> 1:40:13.200 of September. Hey, my birthday is in October. 1:40:13.760 --> 1:40:14.320 I'm gonna go. 1:40:14.400 --> 1:40:17.800 Get that watch on my birthday, even though it's gonna 1:40:17.880 --> 1:40:19.880 kill me to spend that much money. Yeah, just it's 1:40:20.360 --> 1:40:23.320 I have way too many cars, I have a bud like, 1:40:23.439 --> 1:40:25.960 I'm not afraid to spend money, but to strap a 1:40:26.040 --> 1:40:29.839 BMW on your wrist, you have to mentally brace yourself 1:40:29.880 --> 1:40:33.120 for that so my birthday rolls around and I I'm 1:40:33.160 --> 1:40:34.880 gonna do it, and I go to the whole dinky 1:40:34.960 --> 1:40:39.679 stot gone and not only is it gone, you can't 1:40:39.720 --> 1:40:43.000 find them for sale anywhere. Wow, they just have disappeared. 1:40:43.400 --> 1:40:45.360 I have Buddies on forty seventh Street and I'm like, 1:40:45.760 --> 1:40:47.920 find me a Grand Laga one the I think it's 1:40:48.000 --> 1:40:49.439 the one thirty five twenty five. 1:40:49.760 --> 1:40:51.439 We should talk off air, yah yah. Yeah. 1:40:52.240 --> 1:40:55.479 So so you can find them new in Switzerland for 1:40:55.640 --> 1:40:59.000 retail and you still have to pay like a nine percent. 1:41:00.040 --> 1:41:06.920 It's insane. So this was my other longa chop which, 1:41:07.000 --> 1:41:11.840 by the way, this is even more dressy than the Platinum. 1:41:12.160 --> 1:41:15.600 That's almost like a sporty version that watch. And I 1:41:15.960 --> 1:41:17.800 don't want to order it from a site I'm not 1:41:17.880 --> 1:41:20.840 familiar with. Ye, And it turns out that the guys 1:41:20.880 --> 1:41:23.960 that have this watch are an Aventura. I'm at a 1:41:24.040 --> 1:41:27.200 different conference in Miami, and I do my gig. I 1:41:27.320 --> 1:41:31.040 come literally off the stage into an uber run to Aventura, 1:41:31.240 --> 1:41:33.679 look at the watch. They wouldn't take a credit card, 1:41:34.200 --> 1:41:36.760 but I mean it's a whole room full of well 1:41:36.800 --> 1:41:38.320 if they take a credit card, they could charge a 1:41:38.320 --> 1:41:40.360 credit card for you, blah blah blah. But they weren't 1:41:40.400 --> 1:41:43.599 set up to do it there, and so get home 1:41:43.840 --> 1:41:46.080 wired and the next day the watch showed up. So 1:41:46.240 --> 1:41:49.240 this is my I couldn't get my grin langa one 1:41:50.040 --> 1:41:53.360 but and it was forty two. And I'm like, now, 1:41:53.760 --> 1:41:55.440 how often you kick yourself. 1:41:55.160 --> 1:41:57.479 With ye all the time? Yeah? Runs out all the time. 1:41:57.479 --> 1:42:00.160 We can help get that watch even and the the 1:42:00.840 --> 1:42:02.400 other Daytona. And I don't want to make this all 1:42:02.439 --> 1:42:07.280 about my watch shopping, so so I do this with cars. Yeah, 1:42:07.720 --> 1:42:10.439 I have way too many cars. I'll watch a car 1:42:10.640 --> 1:42:13.200 come out, I'll watch the price wobble, and I'm like, 1:42:13.360 --> 1:42:17.640 come to Papa a little lower. And I bought a 1:42:17.720 --> 1:42:20.759 couple of nice things during the beginning of the pandemic 1:42:20.840 --> 1:42:24.000 when people are freaking out, and I'm looking at the 1:42:24.160 --> 1:42:28.400 Daytona in the white, golden blue face, which was I 1:42:28.680 --> 1:42:32.439 think twenty six, twenty eight retail, it was twenty, it 1:42:32.520 --> 1:42:35.920 was nineteen, it was eighteen. I'm buyer at sixteen and 1:42:36.400 --> 1:42:39.559 then the lockdown happens and it's forty five, fifty five, 1:42:39.720 --> 1:42:43.639 sixty five. It just goes nuts. I'm like, for two grand, 1:42:43.680 --> 1:42:44.160 and look. 1:42:44.040 --> 1:42:46.240 What you did? You free. Nobody ever could have guessed though. 1:42:46.400 --> 1:42:50.120 Yeah, so hold aside these million dollar watches, these one 1:42:50.200 --> 1:42:54.400 hundred thousand dollars watches, A newbie interested in watches, how 1:42:54.479 --> 1:42:56.479 did they get involved in watch collecting? 1:42:56.960 --> 1:42:58.560 Where would you send somebody like that? 1:43:00.120 --> 1:43:00.280 Really? 1:43:00.680 --> 1:43:02.519 I think, you know, kind of riffing off of something 1:43:02.640 --> 1:43:07.320 Ben said earlier, which is this kind of there's a 1:43:07.400 --> 1:43:10.120 sense of like the imitation culture, like you want something 1:43:10.160 --> 1:43:14.320 because you see other people having. For me, I personally 1:43:14.400 --> 1:43:16.400 think the best way to build a collection is just 1:43:16.520 --> 1:43:21.200 really follow your passion. Get out there, educate yourself, learn read, 1:43:22.400 --> 1:43:26.200 visit a few retailers, you know, maybe maybe check out 1:43:26.200 --> 1:43:29.719 an auction, you know, catalog to see what's what's considered 1:43:29.800 --> 1:43:32.479 to have a history or provenance of Just do your 1:43:32.520 --> 1:43:34.479 research and then ultimately, you know, pick something that. 1:43:34.520 --> 1:43:35.320 Really speaks to you. 1:43:36.439 --> 1:43:39.760 If there's a way to again weave some sort of 1:43:39.840 --> 1:43:43.519 milestone or personal aspect into the watch. I think one 1:43:43.560 --> 1:43:45.639 thing I often think about is, of all the things 1:43:45.720 --> 1:43:47.519 you put on your person, a watch is one of 1:43:47.560 --> 1:43:49.800 the very few that will actually typically have a story 1:43:49.880 --> 1:43:52.720 associated to it, like your sneakers, your jeans, or your 1:43:52.760 --> 1:43:55.240 sweater typically will not. So I don't know, then there's 1:43:55.240 --> 1:43:57.200 something just special about that. Like like Ben said, they're 1:43:57.240 --> 1:43:59.639 sort of like totems of our lives in some way, 1:43:59.680 --> 1:44:02.759 and a collector, I think, you know, we'll always remember 1:44:02.960 --> 1:44:05.040 her his first watch. I think it's just, you know, 1:44:05.320 --> 1:44:06.760 it's worth it to take the time to do the 1:44:06.840 --> 1:44:09.000 research and really wait for that thing that so to 1:44:09.040 --> 1:44:09.720 speaks your name. 1:44:10.000 --> 1:44:12.240 Yeah, and I would certainly echo all that, but I 1:44:12.280 --> 1:44:15.200 would also say listen to actual experts in a field, 1:44:15.320 --> 1:44:17.160 not the guy you found on YouTube or the gal 1:44:17.240 --> 1:44:19.800 you found on Instagram or TikTok. There's so many people 1:44:19.880 --> 1:44:22.040 out there that are purporting to be experts in this space, 1:44:22.360 --> 1:44:25.040 mostly on social media, YouTube, TikTok, etcetera, that have no idea. 1:44:25.040 --> 1:44:26.920 I mean, they're just kids that think they understand things. 1:44:27.120 --> 1:44:28.599 And to be clear, I was one of those kids. 1:44:28.640 --> 1:44:30.720 I've since put in fifteen years to ensure that I'm 1:44:30.760 --> 1:44:32.880 not one of those kids. And there are people out 1:44:32.920 --> 1:44:34.760 there that really know watches, and then there are people 1:44:34.760 --> 1:44:37.880 out there that really don't and pretend to understand the source. 1:44:37.920 --> 1:44:39.960 I mean, going back to journalism school, like know your source, 1:44:40.120 --> 1:44:42.719 know who's saying what and why, know who's a retailer, 1:44:42.760 --> 1:44:44.960 of so and so, you know who owns twenty of these, 1:44:45.000 --> 1:44:47.200 so they're trying to build it up. Really understand why 1:44:47.280 --> 1:44:48.559 people are saying things that they. 1:44:48.479 --> 1:44:51.560 Are, and any particular brands you would send people, Just 1:44:51.840 --> 1:44:54.800 like I always tell people someone asked me about to watch, 1:44:54.840 --> 1:44:56.400 I'm like, hey, go look at Saco. 1:44:56.560 --> 1:44:57.280 Say if you're. 1:44:57.120 --> 1:44:58.840 Wrong, YEA, spend four hundred dollars. 1:44:59.120 --> 1:45:02.040 Yeah, Sekos Watch System fifty one self finding watch for 1:45:02.120 --> 1:45:04.320 one hundred and fifty bucks. We sell them on Hoodinky. 1:45:04.320 --> 1:45:05.479 They're amazing, they really are. 1:45:06.080 --> 1:45:08.160 And and the next step from there, and then we'll 1:45:08.160 --> 1:45:11.519 go then then Hamilton, Hamilton field Watches really handsome. Wow, 1:45:11.680 --> 1:45:15.240 great watch, solid, solid, long lasting. I agree, all right, 1:45:15.360 --> 1:45:16.680 Now I'm going to take you one last one. I 1:45:16.760 --> 1:45:19.360 keep saying last one. So you go past Hamilton, where 1:45:19.360 --> 1:45:19.600 do you go? 1:45:19.760 --> 1:45:22.040 Tag tag Hoyer, Uh huh, you know a Tag Hoyer, 1:45:22.120 --> 1:45:24.639 Aqua Racer, a Tag Hoyer, Monaco. 1:45:24.760 --> 1:45:26.920 Even those are great watches. Carreras, they're a little bit 1:45:26.960 --> 1:45:30.040 more money, but great watches. Great, Jeff, anything from. 1:45:29.880 --> 1:45:32.599 You, I would say, you know, I love the Hamilton pick. 1:45:32.640 --> 1:45:35.320 I think the Hamilton field Watch is like a total classic. 1:45:35.760 --> 1:45:38.439 I bought their new Krono by the way, is really 1:45:38.600 --> 1:45:42.439 crazy handsome for what it is. Yeah, and very reasonably priced. Yeah. 1:45:42.800 --> 1:45:45.000 I bought the Field watch for my brother and one 1:45:45.080 --> 1:45:47.519 for myself kind of when I joined Hodinky as a 1:45:47.720 --> 1:45:50.439 nice little celebration of that moment. And then if I 1:45:50.479 --> 1:45:52.880 were going to go one level, I'd say the Tutor 1:45:52.920 --> 1:45:55.040 black Bay fifty eight, and we talked a little bit about. 1:45:56.520 --> 1:45:57.680 Nine to keep up. 1:45:57.760 --> 1:45:59.680 For me, it's perfect kind of size, it's it's a 1:45:59.720 --> 1:46:00.840 great everyday watch. 1:46:01.479 --> 1:46:03.880 They have a very vintage vibe to it. That's kind 1:46:03.920 --> 1:46:07.600 of what attracted me to them. Guys, thank you so 1:46:07.720 --> 1:46:10.840 much for such a generous spot with your time. Next 1:46:10.880 --> 1:46:13.120 time we do this, I'll have a camera crew, we'll 1:46:13.120 --> 1:46:15.800 do talking watch U I'll just do I'll just grab 1:46:15.880 --> 1:46:19.200 a dozen watches from people here and thank you guys 1:46:19.280 --> 1:46:22.320 for being so generous with your time. If you enjoy 1:46:22.439 --> 1:46:24.880 this conversation, well, be sure and check out any of 1:46:24.920 --> 1:46:28.760 the previous four hundred and ninety three such discussions we've 1:46:28.840 --> 1:46:33.080 had over the previous nine years. You can find those 1:46:33.360 --> 1:46:37.719 at YouTube, iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you find. 1:46:37.520 --> 1:46:38.680 Your favorite podcasts. 1:46:39.600 --> 1:46:42.679 Sign up for my daily reading list at ridults dot com. 1:46:43.120 --> 1:46:46.600 Follow me on Twitter, at rid Holts follow all of 1:46:46.720 --> 1:46:50.880 the Bloomberg Family of podcasts on Twitter at podcasts. I 1:46:50.960 --> 1:46:52.920 would be remiss if I did not thank the correct 1:46:52.960 --> 1:46:57.240 team that helps put these conversations together each week. Paris 1:46:57.360 --> 1:47:01.479 Wold is my producer. Samantha Danziger is my audio engineer. 1:47:01.640 --> 1:47:05.479 Sean Russo is my researcher. At Teak of al Bron 1:47:05.600 --> 1:47:09.040 is my project manager. I'm Barry Ridolts. You're listening to 1:47:09.160 --> 1:47:11.639 Masters in Business on Bloomberg Radio.