Seen the news yesterday and thought to myself:
“Well, hopefully, they won’t replicate the customer experience from the Geneva boutique inside of Bucherer.”
Thoughts currently rattling around my pumpkin:
It's essentially against the brand's ethos, but since it is a proven concept by others (AP, PP, Hermes, etc.), it makes sense to some extent.
The decades-long partnership between the brands and the personal relationships there, made it probably much easier and more pleasant to shake on a deal, plus the now burning question of “whats next after I'm gone” contributed heavily I would think.
The grey market, which was left alone and thriving for years, but we knew its end was coming as soon as RLX announced its pre-owned certified program, is going to go back to where it was 10-15 years ago, with the notable exception of volume.
The interest now is much much higher than it used to be, especially among the younger generations, but then again there's the question of authentic interest and a speculatory one. My sober guess is about 60% of that volume is speculatory, but hey, +40% over a decade, when your average RSP is around €12k is pretty good.
It won’t deter every grey, self-proclaimed expert Ferrari driving private jet flying dealer scumbag, but my (maybe slightly too optimistic) opinion is, that it will ruin enough of them to make RLX collecting (in GEN) make sense again, even tho with a slightly higher price tag, due to the brand's price increases.
One could argue, that the reason tons more people are now interested in horology, watchmaking, or just collecting or the industry in general from a journalist's point of view, was because of these dealers that generate clickbait headlines somewhere every waking day for years. Not to mention video, audio and written content. Theres multiple companies built on that very business model ffs
Sure it came with the BS that it came with, but it seems it's just a short dark period in watchmaking, thats being dealt with long term. Kinda like the Quartz crisis, although with much less umpf and implications than that one lol.
TL;DR: In the long run, it's a good thing for both RLX and its consumers, I think. The positives still outweigh the negatives from my perspective.
i dont have any friends and finally have some free time rn, so im just trynna chat and be involved
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