Hodinkee/Crown & Caliber… bad customer service?

Not sure if there’s a better subforum for this.

I’ve bought from C&C once or twice and sold to Hodinkee. I’ve also insured my more expensive watches with Hodinkee. Thus far it’s all been easy and communicative, inspiring trust. (I’m big on customer service and prompt communication—at the first whiff of sketchiness I tend to bail.)

Generally a fan of Hodinkee’s content too—the site and the podcasts.

But in my latest experience I’m growing… skeptical. Or at least curious. And I’m wondering if others have had recent experiences with either (they’re the same, really) that might put my mind at ease. Or confirm my suspicions.

There’s a watch I’m interested in—pretty much ready to commit—but I do want a little more info. H/C&C rarely includes caseback photos, which is weird and annoying, and also, while they provide a decent amount of info, they don’t include the lug to lug dimension, which is the main thing I wanted to know as this is a smaller piece and I want to be confident that I’ll like the fit. I also want to know if the pricing is negotiable. All pretty standard questions, I’d think, and phrased with gratitude and politeness.

Made the inquiry in mid April. Took about a week before I received a totally boilerplate reply about assuring me my questions were valuable and were being escalated to the appropriate “team for further attention and resolution” (as if I’d raised an issue?). It was super weird. Another two weeks have passed—nothing. This was via Crown & Caliber. The other day I decided to give it one more shot—this time via Hodinkee. Nothing.

I’m wondering if maybe they’ve just gotten too big too fast or something, and are no longer interested in doing customer service? I’m considering not renewing my insurance with them, as this has left a pretty bad taste in my mouth. But maybe others have had ok experiences recently? My positive ones were all a couple years ago.

It makes me wonder what the actual buying process would be like. How long before they’d bother processing the order and shipping the watch? (I did consider just clicking buy and then returning the watch if I didn’t like the fit, but that seems like a huge waste of packaging and postal service resources and the cost of insured postage on their end when all I need is a measurement over email.)

Any thoughts? (Here or via pm is fine.)

I heard they laid off most of their staff. The crown and caliber staff were the first to go

Oh wow—I had no idea. I feel bad, as both sites had been great to work with. They keep cranking out podcasts, so hopefully that end of Hodinkee remains sustainable.

…One would hope a downturn in the preowned watch market would mean lowered prices and not just staff getting laid off.

Thanks for the information!

Another, older, article on the topic. Somehow I totally missed this.

https://www.businessoffashion.com/n...ury-watch-site-hodinkee-cuts-a-fifth-of-jobs/

This one also taught me of the existence of the Bloomberg Subdial Index, which tracks the watch market. I had no idea such a thing existed. Apparently the market is down 35% over two years.

https://subdial.com/market#!

Sorry if this is ancient, uninteresting news to all but me. Maybe I’m behind the curve.

…though funnily enough, of the handful of brands tracked by that index, Omega has had the best month by far. By a considerable factor.

It is, and this is an interesting data point- but how much was it up over the 2 years before the decline started?

Their focus as a company and employees sure have changed. They now have a style editor (without much knowledge on watches) giving lectures at the Horological Society of New York.

I get that this is more about the company but generally I search for the specs online. Sometimes one site may say 44mm lug to lug and another says 43. Not much difference but I’ll do the open source research. If you post the model you were originally interested in I’m sure somebody could get you the measurements you were seeking.

It’s actually a discontinued JLC, not an Omega. And I did my internet research and found what I believe is the answer. (In Tim Mosso’s review the same ref in a different metal he provided the number—he’s usually pretty thorough and accurate.) But H/C&C do some funny things, saying the watch is 35mm when everyone else says 34. I just wanted some confirmation. Also wanted to see about pricing as I have other watches under consideration and I think they’re about $800 too high for what they have.

I should also add: fastidious bastard that I am, I like to have a person-to-person interaction with the seller before clicking Buy and to have them do something like this that requires them to pull and inspect the actual watch I want to buy.

My reasons are pretty straightforward. I had a problem with a different Georgia-based dealer when I bought a Rolex: went through the whole deal and then they dropped the news that the watch I’d selected from their inventory wasn’t available anymore but they were going to sub in another of the same reference with a different dial but they could swap in any dial
I wanted, blah blah blah. It was a very bad experience. Before spending thousands (which is real money for me) on a watch, I want to know there’s a human there that I can talk to, not just a button to click. And I want positive confirmation that they actually have the actual watch that’s in the actual pictures in their actual hands to ship to me. There’s no watch I want so badly that I’m willing to risk not verifying this—I’ve learned my lesson.

I've picked up a few things from them pre-C&C, and while I had one item arrive so badly packed that an extra strap had fallen out, they made it good without quibble.

A few months ago I was interested in a used watch as a possible gift for a family member. It looked to be in good shape, but since there were only a few pix in the listing for a watch that had several iterations, I followed up asking for additional details. I did get a reply a week later, directing me to the C&C guarantee page. When I asked again for a response to the original query, and If better photos were available, I did not receive a reply.

I passed on the watch.

I think it's perfectly reasonable for a large vendor, especially one affiliated with an influential watch mag/ site, to be detailed and transparent about the watches it sells, at least in line with your better eBay seller, and ideally with the enthusiast market it targets. For whatever reasons, that was not my experience with H/C&C, and if I buy from them again, it's unlikely to be a high-dollar item.YMMV, of course.

It's a shame, as they've got some great pieces in their inventory, and the one I'm after---I can't (at the moment) find another of the same reference in the US. I was essentially waiting, money in hand, for them to answer a few basic questions. Had my eye on a couple other possibilities, but nothing I liked as much---they didn't have any real competition here. But at this point, I've moved on. I feel bad for them if they took a gamble and lost, and I especially feel bad for the folks who got laid off. Not sure there's a "villain" here to speak of---like I said, I genuinely like (and regularly consume) their written & recorded content, and wish them well. But at this point I have fading trust in them as a dealer of expensive watches. Plenty of other sellers out there; may just let my point-of-contact at WatchBox know what I'm after and wait for him to let me know when one comes in. (He always replies promptly. Same with EuropeanWatch, Nashville, OCWatch, etc, etc.)

OP - wish you the best, and hope you'll get the timepiece you want!

It's sad and disappointing when an organization you once revered and trusted is going down hill! Your thread is making me re-think my watch insurance...however I think Hodinkee is merely the middle-man as the underwriter is Chubb, a well respected insurance company.

P.S. not to derail this thread...who do y'all use for watch insurance?

I also use Hodinkee/Chubb. Have never had to make a claim. I think a lot of people here just add it to their homeowners policy.