I often see watch enthusiasts here and on YouTube forgetting some essencial things:
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Watches are an object in which "The beauty is in the eye of the beholder". It's not brand name or bragging credentials that make a watch good or even the design. It's the personal taste of each of us
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The price doesn't make a watch better. The variety and styles of watches can appeal to everyone regardless of their budget. Despite this, people buying fashion watches or less expensive brands, still face backlash
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Mechanical watches are not always better than quartz and quartz isn't always better than mechanical. They cater to different types of audience. Usually the community acts like mechanical is always inherently better.
All things considered, it's wonderful that there's a brand of watches out there that provides finish and quality that matches a Longines or JLC for a quarter of the price and it makes its own movements for mechanical watches: Seiko.
Seiko, is what the entire Swatch group no longer is. It's a independent watchmaker. Their Grand Seiko models, rival and even surpass Rolex watches in finish, quality, dial textures and more.
If Seiko was a Swiss brand, it would be the world's biggest and most valued watchmaker
Having said that, why is it then that there's so so many complaints about: the glass type they use, the Quality control which fails slightly in like 1/1000 watches? Why does anyone think Citizen can beat Seiko when Citizen's movements are now a long way from those of Seiko?
Why aren't more people grateful that a brand like this even exists?
Brings me to the final point: - Watches don't have to say "Swiss made" to be good. Something that despite true the community also acts like isn't true.
This is actually true, they started closing in on things like Tissot or even Frederique Constant lately and that isn't exactly as much of a sweet spot value wise as where they were before. But there's still good offerings for their watches at the same time. In fact I would say it's the ideal time to still manage to sweep some nice mechanical models by them...after this decade they'll get real pricey. It just blew up in terms of popularity. But I'm also glad it did as it also is nice to see them getting better and better
To be honest though I don't see what's the deal with glasses in any brand..it's not like you're gonna be using your watch as a hammer everyday anyways
Well if the competition is offering sapphire at that price point, why cant seiko?
I find my hardlex get scratched often enough for it to be annoyance to me. In a sub 300 dollar watch, no problem.
Not to rattle on, but seiko did offer sapphire in their sarb line, at a great price point. Sarb033 is my daily and I love it.
If they offered it before and stopped that's not ok honestly