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Business is not booming for Hodinkee

Syrte
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Evitzee Evitzee
LVMH badly wanted Hermes a few years ago and it slipped away. The Tiffany deal was very rocky and there is no guarantee Arnault can make it work, and there have been other LVMH misfires over the years. I doubt they have more than a few million dollars invested in the Hodinkee gig, lunch money hardly worth worrying about.

It’ll be interesting to see how the Tiffany deal plays out over time, but you can’t really blame LVMH for their failure to take over Hermes- 72% of the shares were family held, like Chanel they’ve been exclusive and at the top of their game for decades, it’s like trying to acquire Rolex or Patek Philippe.
You can try, but if the target’s not in a selling mood, good luck. LVMH still managed to become the largest non family shareholder.
As for their stake in Hodinkee, as stated above the figure I read was 40 million. (Dollars or euros, I forget).
Which indeed is probably like lunch money for them.
 
jjen
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Clymer likes to give his "origin story" about how the watch forums were so mean and inaccessible which inspired him to make a blog about watches blah blah blah. So in other words he thinks we suck, so there's that
 
noelekal
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He probably only hung around the Rolex forum.
 
JwRosenthal
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jjen jjen
Clymer likes to give his "origin story" about how the watch forums were so mean and inaccessible which inspired him to make a blog about watches blah blah blah. So in other words he thinks we suck, so there's that
Maybe if he just got a hug and a Constellation, the world could have been a different place.
 
Danwales
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During the Pandemic Hodinkee did a series where normal folk talked about a watch they owned and the story behind it. It was the best thing they had done and yet the feature didn't last long. These days I will click on the site out of habit , invariably see there's nothing there to interest me and then move on.
 
Jones in LA
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And to add yet another 'there is no tooth fairy' moment to the conversation, I found this in the "About" section of the Fratello website:

"...Fratello joined the Chrono24 group of companies in 2018 to expand its exceptional growth trajectory."
 
sxl2004
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Jones in LA Jones in LA
And to add yet another 'there is no tooth fairy' moment to the conversation, I found this in the "About" section of the Fratello website:

"...Fratello joined the Chrono24 group of companies in 2018 to expand its exceptional growth trajectory."

Aren’t they separated again?
 
jjen
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JwRosenthal JwRosenthal
Maybe if he just got a hug and a Constellation, the world could have been a different place.
Strangely his grandpa gave him that mark 40 speedy right? So he could have gone the RJ route and been first in line for every LE speedy…
 
krogerfoot
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This is a well-reported article. It doesn’t editorialize but they do give the last word to this person rather than any of the company’s mouthpieces.
“Hodinkee was founded on the idea that it was honest, and that if we didn’t like something, we would say that,” said a person familiar with its editorial strategy. “But it started doing what its competitors did, which was plugging with editorial what we sold in the shop, and readers reacted negatively to that.”

I’ve made fun of Hodinkee quite a bit over the years, because it’s fun and there is a lot there to mock, but I won’t pretend to have any useful business insight. I am one of many who first got interested in watches through Hondinkee’s articles and features.

It’s a shame more energy and attention weren’t focused on producing well-written, or at least competently proofread, informative and entertaining articles. My impudent commentary about the Hodinkee house style often drew pushback that Clymer and his team were just smartly following the money and were clearly doing something right.

https://omegaforums.net/threads/this-craft-we-call-writing-the-hodinkee-house-style.109663/
https://omegaforums.net/threads/the-hodinkee-house-style-april-2020.112737/
 
jsducote
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I can count on one hand the number of websites that haven't declined in quality over the past 5 years. Although "the internet is forever," it's also true that nothing good lasts forever.
 
Mark020
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Exactly. It all starts as a fun project. The next step is making money and then all principles go over board.
 
Evitzee
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I always quote the great longshoreman philosopher, Eric Hoffer, "Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket". This is the norm, hard to find many examples that don't follow this path to some extent.
Edited:
 
jjen
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krogerfoot krogerfoot
This is a well-reported article. It doesn’t editorialize but they do give the last word to this person rather than any of the company’s mouthpieces.


I’ve made fun of Hodinkee quite a bit over the years, because it’s fun and there is a lot there to mock, but I won’t pretend to have any useful business insight. I am one of many who first got interested in watches through Hondinkee’s articles and features.

It’s a shame more energy and attention weren’t focused on producing well-written, or at least competently proofread, informative and entertaining articles. My impudent commentary about the Hodinkee house style often drew pushback that Clymer and his team were just smartly following the money and were clearly doing something right.

https://omegaforums.net/threads/this-craft-we-call-writing-the-hodinkee-house-style.109663/
https://omegaforums.net/threads/the-hodinkee-house-style-april-2020.112737/
Yes I have heard some variation of this argument countless times. Clearly they are now doing something wrong. Bernie Madoff was “clearly doing something right” until the whole scheme collapsed
 
STANDY
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The wealth of any watch community is the a) the new interested in watches b) middle enthusiast collectors

With Hodinkee a decision to only cater to the Rich investment new to watches. Because anyone rich but really into watches Hodinkee had nothing for them.

Turns out their downfall was only targeting a small part of a big market and forgetting the large numbers of the community.

I will admit when I end up on Hodinkee looking to read about a new watch released I usually scroll straight down to the price. Yet on Fratello I would usually read the content.
 
sheepdoll
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Sadly the article is behind a paywall. Only the first paragraph can be read.

Screen Shot 2024-06-02 at 12.56.24 PM.png
 
noelekal
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Sheepdoll; I though that you and the other Omega Forum denizens were the nearest thing to a wonky watch world celebrity that could be had.
 
sheepdoll
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Omega really then needs to give me a 'Snoopy' So I can blog about it and create interesting you tube content for the myriad of people I influence ...

Who needs thousands of followers when my 5 TwittterX and Instagram are enough for anyone. And I am going to update the blog an videos, real soon now (as soon as I finish reading all the threads here.)
 
Mark020
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sheepdoll sheepdoll
Sadly the article is behind a paywall. Only the first paragraph can be read.

Screen Shot 2024-06-02 at 12.56.24 PM.png
Archive.ph is your friend
 
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