![]() Rolex Watch Prices: Historical and Current From Actual Sales Numbersįurthermore, because grey dealers don’t have to adhere to brand rules, they can sell watches via channels that suit customers. And there are plenty of clients who are willing to pay those premium prices as long as they get to buy their grail watches.īreaking Down Rolex Prices: Retail vs. The focus isn’t exclusively on rock-bottom prices anymore – access and availability are now a big part of the watch grey market. Grey dealers can offer access to exceedingly difficult-to-find watches but of course, at a premium. So the role of the grey market dealer has morphed as the market conditions changed. Clients are told they have to put their names on waitlists and wait by the phone for a call if their dream watch ever becomes available to them. Once relatively easy-to-find watch models at boutiques are no longer in stock and authorized stores are often empty. The luxury watch market boom we’ve witnessed over five or so years has led to a shortage of popular watches at ADs. While grey market dealers were once synonymous with discounted prices, things have changed dramatically. Online platforms such as and others allow American consumers to easily access grey market watches, sometimes for far less than they might be sold for at a luxury watch retail store. ![]() The United States is the second-biggest market for Swiss watches and is a hub for grey market watches. A Google search for any luxury watch now allows shoppers to see the prices offered by grey market dealers and buy their luxury watches online. Now that the internet is such an integral part of the business, grey market retailers have been able to create a far bigger presence on the web. Unless you actually walked into a grey market watch dealer’s store, it was highly unlikely you would ever know they existed or that you could purchase watches at highly discounted prices. These transactions made little difference on the typical authorized retail channels. Pre-internet, grey market retailers often existed in major cities and had a storefront where they could display the watches and sell them at highly discounted prices. The grey dealer then sells these discounted watches through their own channels and passes on big savings to their clients, which can include wholesale or retail customers. That is unless they have access to a grey market dealer that is willing to make large volume orders in exchange for low prices. ![]() It’s not hard to see how this strategy from the top can lead to bloated inventories for ADs that can be hard to move. Plus, when business is slow for ADs, the manufacturers do not allow them to cut retail prices, fearing that this may damage the brand’s reputation and value in their customers’ eyes. Remember, an authorized retailer is highly controlled by the brand, which means that the AD is often pressured to buy slower-moving watches to gain access to popular watches. It may come as a surprise to some outside the industry, but it’s uncommon for authorized retailers to reach out to grey market dealers with deeply discounted bulk offers when they have excess inventory.
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