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Vercingetorix
··Spam RiskI’ve just gone blind.
Business is not booming for Hodinkee
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JwRosenthal
·Social Lifestyle commentary presented to watch enthusiasts. What could go wrong?
https://www.hodinkee.com/articles/the-cartier-tank-cintree
How To Wear It The Cartier Tank Cintrée
A vintage watch made modern.
The comments are priceless.
Look 1: The deconstructed suit.
Look 2: Sweatsuit and penny loafers.
Look 3: The return to Preppy.
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liquidsongbird
·I felt as though they suffered from a bit of hubris as the watch market took off several years ago. That plus the initial bashing of certain brands which then were sold in the site, and acceptable to them… made me take all their editorial a bit differently. The whole vibe changed to being way too cool for a dork like me to be comfortable.
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0002s
·I wasn’t aware that dinky had a collab with Goodwill.
The business model they started with is/was limited from the beginning. Watch enthusiast are a small group and watches in general moving towards smart watches. Small audience with varying tastes in very diverse hobby.
Their ability to generate revenue through the site, videos and collaborations could only go so far with the enthusiast base. To broaden that base they started to move the content to a Social Lifestyles angle that tangentially based around watches. They also moved the pure watch content to an upscale vibe and adding a dash of Social Lifestyles. The attempt it to grab the 20-45 somethings that are interested in fashion and watches. It currently appears they did not capture enough of that demographic and have soured some of their base demographic.
Because no heritage brand will sell online only without brick and mortar store, they were forced into adding collaboration watches and vintage watches to increase their web traffic pull through sales. This also forced them to create content that focused on watch they had in the vintage inventories. Then they could add pass through $$'s with additional fashion sales through 3rd parties. This also soured some of the original base.
Now the brick and mortar store I believe was an attempt to attract heritage brands and have a watch boutique (think Teddy B's new store in Cleveland). My guess was they through they could do a NYC Boutique and then expand. This allowed them to leverage the B&M and web traffic as one.
All was well while the COVID watch high was booming and prices for vintage were soaring. Then inflation and a slowing economy.
The best laid plans....we can figure out the rest.
I don't believe they will fail unless they loose interest or they are behind the scenes so heavily in debt that eventually the plug gets pulled. I don't see their current model being all that successful in the current economy as their 200K, 3 watch a year @ $7,500, MBA buyer is more worried about gas and food that 5K travel alarm clocks.
Some of their content is interesting, but it's the pure watch content I enjoy. The article I listed is a prime example of "who the hell dress like this with a Tank on?"
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jjen
·I really enjoyed their content and it helped me a lot early on. Nowadays I hardly find an article I want to read. The style and fashion articles that others have referenced here are really off putting. Their whole vibe has become very elitist. It used to be like "if you have a speedmaster, then you are cool and a member of the watchfam" and now it's more like "you are trash if you don't own a Le Mans Daytona and a Tiffany stamped 5711." I feel for the people who lost their jobs but I have no sympathy for the founder who is off posting pictures of himself gallivanting around Europe, drinking champagne with celebrities, and scooting around in vintage Porsches while his staff gets cut by two-thirds. No wonder the former employees are talking to the WSJ!
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kkt
·Yeah- this was offensive. They also did a “ghost edition” M10P for $15k (a standard M10-p was about $8k and the 35/1.4 bundled lens was about $3k- so about a $4k markup for the color).
Clymer’s “what Leica means to me” article upon its release was filled with sappy nostalgia and a few humble brags about his growing Leica collection- as soon as I read he owned the Hermes collab I knew exactly who he was- Leica is jewelry to him- as it most likely is to the majority of the readers who bought the ghost edition new.
The old joke was that photographers were always the second owners of Leica’s- after the doctors and lawyers. Now I guess we have to get in line after the influencers and lifestyle aspirants.
That was a real product? I thought it was a spoof.
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JwRosenthal
·That was a real product? I thought it was a spoof.
Leica does custom orders (they have an “My Leica” kind of service) and LE’s (they are worse than Omega)- most were historically purchased by collectors, but they have become fashion statements over the last decade.
LHSA (Leica historical Society of America) contracted a few models over the decades with special engravings or revivals of classic models- those are worth some serious money.
The collab they did with Hermes was kind of the beginning of the fashion-meets function.
The top metal parts had a special finish, special colors on the engravings on the lenses, clad in Hermes leather with an Hermes branded strap (I want the strap in the worst way) with a three lens set at $25k (which in hindsight wasn’t a horrible deal as the M9 and 3 lenses offered from a regular camera store in factory finishes was probably around $21-22k at the time, so add the leather and Hermes branding and that’s not a “huge” markup) or with a custom Hermes bag for $50k. They offered it as a digital M9 or film M7 (not sure if the $50k price tag was for both film and digi or just with the bag. This was the kind of thing you would see in the Neiman’s Christmas catalog- so ridiculously expensive compared to the standard models (which are still rediculously expensive) that it requires someone to have fυck-you money to even contemplate it.
Lenny Kravitz is an avid Leica shooter/collector (as is Brad Pitt) and was/is one of their ambassadors. They did a collab with him taking a Safari edition green M (they have done a variation on the safari green since the early 80’s) - and cladding it in reptile skin.
Again, stupid money. So the Dink collab was nothing new, but it was the hubris of them selling it- punching way above their weight class.
Edited:
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RevZMan123
·They did have some good writers whose enthusiasm for watches came through
Once Jack Forster left, it was all over for watch nerds at Hodinkee. The writing was on the wall previously and you could see it in the comments -- all the regular readers just felt it became an advertising arm for LVMH to push their overpriced investment ideas on the blog readers who got Clymer to the point where he was able to be bought out in the first place. He lost sight of the vision and succumbed to money. Period.
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jjen
·I guess it's hard to scale up vintage watches. You have to worry about authenticity, condition, correct parts, etc. Preowned makes sense except they bought high sold low instead of the other way around. But I think the community wouldn't be as annoyed if they hadn't changed their focus so much towards fashion and celebrity and the site didn't feel so sales oriented instead of collector oriented
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Mark020
··not the sharpest pencil in the ΩF drawerSome may find this 2016 exchange that I had with "Louis", who was at the time the head of vintage sales at Hodinkee, to be interesting and/or amusing. I had taken exception to Hodinkee's misuse of the word "Calatrava" in a sales listing. 😁
Let me begin by echoing others in saying that Louis deserves credit for engaging the (largely) skeptical rabble, and I think that I can speak for other forum members in saying that we appreciate the effort.
Having said that, I find his above quote to be truly remarkable, and not in a positive sense. This is from Patek Philippe's own website, under "History", in 1932:
How, exactly, is it possible that someone apparently tasked with overseeing vintage sales at such a high-profile (now) dealer could make such a basic mistake? Or perhaps the manufacturer has made an error on their website that Louis would like to correct (that's a joke).
In fact, on Hodinkee's own website, there are references to the well-documented status of the ref. 96, rendering Louis' erroneous claim even more bizarre. Here's just one example, from a 5/28/14 article:
Furthermore, on what possible basis does he get the idea that prior to the mid-'80s Calatrava models were not dress watches? Preposterous!
Finally, while he admits that the use of "Calatrava" is "technically" incorrect, he attempts to justify its use in this case by asserting that:
A specific case shape? As in round? Coupled with a thin bezel?
Please, Louis.
Regards,
Tony C.
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Larry S
··Color Commentator for the Hyperbole.Once Jack Forster left, it was all over for watch nerds at Hodinkee. The writing was on the wall previously and you could see it in the comments -- all the regular readers just felt it became an advertising arm for LVMH to push their overpriced investment ideas on the blog readers who got Clymer to the point where he was able to be bought out in the first place. He lost sight of the vision and succumbed to money. Period.
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jsducote
·Reading about Hodinkee has put me in mind to rewatch Fight Club...
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S.H.
·I guess it's hard to scale up vintage watches. You have to worry about authenticity, condition, correct parts, etc. Preowned makes sense except they bought high sold low instead of the other way around. But I think the community wouldn't be as annoyed if they hadn't changed their focus so much towards fashion and celebrity and the site didn't feel so sales oriented instead of collector oriented
IMHO, you just can't scale up vintage watches: way too much expertise involved, very labor intensive. You quickly end up with a stupidly overpriced inventory to cover costs.
One of the iffy thing that happened lately was the association between hodinkee and Montanari / goldberger. Too many problems with watches listed at auctions...
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liquidsongbird
·For anyone in need of a new band, they have a sale going on…bought a couple for $22.50 each. Hopefully they are decent but can’t beat the price.
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Dsloan
·For anyone in need of a new band, they have a sale going on…bought a couple for $22.50 each. Hopefully they are decent but can’t beat the price.
Thanks for sharing this! Looks like they were cleaning out old stock of 18mm and 19mm straps. I just bought maybe too many.
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JwRosenthal
·I looked too and if they are the straps I think they are (made by a manufacturer known for quality mass produced straps) then they are a good value at $25.
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Dsloan
·I looked too and if they are the straps I think they are (made by a manufacturer known for quality mass produced straps) then they are a good value at $25.
I'm curious how they are in reality. The pics have always looked decent, but I sure wasn't paying $125+ for them.
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Dsloan
·For anyone in need of a new band, they have a sale going on…bought a couple for $22.50 each. Hopefully they are decent but can’t beat the price.
Thanks again for sharing the news! The quality seems solid, especially for $25 a piece.
Edit: ... I might buy a few more. My plans to learn how to make my own are on hold for the summer (life is too busy), and I could load up on all the leather straps I reasonably need for a few years.
Edited:
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liquidsongbird
·Great to hear. I grabbed two but haven’t received them yet. Thanks
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Dsloan
·Great to hear. I grabbed two but haven’t received them yet. Thanks
Let me know what you think when they arrive. I ordered another 8 of them. Gotta help those poor folks at Hodinkee make payroll.
