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avidmark
·Was it on par with what the brand is now, or was Omega a generic Swiss brand back in the day that just survived the quartz crisis?
Was Omega as prestigious in the 50' & 60's?
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gatorcpa
··ΩF InvestiGator
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gatorcpa
··ΩF InvestiGatorPlease read this article:
https://www.timeandwatches.com/p/omega-and-olympic-games-history-of.html?m=1
gatorcpa
https://www.timeandwatches.com/p/omega-and-olympic-games-history-of.html?m=1
gatorcpa
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dsio
··Ash @ ΩFWas it on par with what the brand is now, or was Omega a generic Swiss brand back in the day that just survived the quartz crisis?
They were also doing some amazing things in observatory competitions decades earlier and made the transitions to automatics better than most brands.
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marcn
·My dad, born 1925, who it must be said was not any kind of a watch guy, mentioned more than once to me when I was a kid and I’d try to express my enthusiasm for watches said, “when you had an Omega, you knew you’d made it.”
He never mentioned brands for anything else. He was absolutely not a “brand guy” - I doubt such thinking was at all common in his generation. But he sure as heck knew Omega. And to him, they were the best. Perhaps because all his peers and mentors (physicians) wore them.
He never mentioned brands for anything else. He was absolutely not a “brand guy” - I doubt such thinking was at all common in his generation. But he sure as heck knew Omega. And to him, they were the best. Perhaps because all his peers and mentors (physicians) wore them.
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jjen
·I think it depended on the country but Rolex and Omega were at similar top levels in terms of reputation. We have a family legend that my grandfather in China in the 1920's once owned an Omega "worth as much as a house." Sadly, it was lost over the ensuing decades of war
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JwRosenthal
·With my family here in the US, it was Omega and Bulova as perceived premium brands. Rolex who?
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gbesq
·No way was Rolex on par with Omega in terms of reputation in the 1950s and early 1960's. At that time, Omega was clearly the watch to own when you had arrived. Rolex really enhanced its reputation during the quartz crisis in the 1970s. While Omega reacted to the crisis by broadening - many would say overbroadening - its product lines, embracing quartz movements, funky styles and producing some admittedly poor quality, entry level watches, Rolex stayed the course by focusing on a much more limited portfolio of mechanical watches while working hard to enhance its brand awareness through clever marketing. After Omega was acquired by the Swatch Group, there was a gradual reemphasis on the quality of production that had made the brand an industry leader, but Omega's marketing strategy contiinued to be inferior to Rolex. The result is what we have today. Both brands manufacturing very high quality mass produced luxury watches, but with Omega playing second fiddle to Rolex in terms of brand awareness among consumers.
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wagudc
·With my family here in the US, it was Omega and Bulova as perceived premium brands. Rolex who?
My grandparents owned a jewelry store that sold watches, and that was the case for them exactly. If you wanted a watch that could take a beating they would sell you a Wyler. My grandpa had a customer that was a one-armed logger, and Wyler was the only brand of watch he didn't destroy.
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Davidt
·My step dad was an antique clock restorer. During my childhood there was always antique clock parts all over the house and he usually wore a Speedmaster (mk2 or 4 from memory).
I recall being quite young and asking him why if he liked clocks and watches he didn’t wear a Rolex (this is probably late 80’s) and he replied Rolex are all fancy cases and advertising, the movements are rubbish. If you want a nice watch, you buy an Omega.
I recall being quite young and asking him why if he liked clocks and watches he didn’t wear a Rolex (this is probably late 80’s) and he replied Rolex are all fancy cases and advertising, the movements are rubbish. If you want a nice watch, you buy an Omega.
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Stan Cooke
·Back in 1967 I was seeking a good quality watch to celebrate my 21st birthday, to use as my daily timepiece hopefully for the rest of my life. For me, there were only two contenders: the Rolex GMT-Master and the Omega Speedmaster. These were the days of the NASA Apollo moon programme and the Omega 'Moonwatch' was highly regarded. My recollection is that in the UK at that time, Omega was considered as one of the very best watchmakers, up there with the likes of Rolex and Patek Phillipe. In the end I went for the Rolex GMT-Master because it is an automatic and its water-resistance was slightly better than the Speedmaster's.
Stan.
Stan.
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Davidt
·What happened to that watch @Stan Cooke
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bananapeanut
·IMO, the only way for Omega to regain its prestigious status is to claim its independence from the Swatch Group.
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gbesq
·IMO, the only way for Omega to regain its prestigious status is to claim its independence from the Swatch Group.
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bananapeanut
·This is certainly not to say that Rolex’s build quality - excellent, but not the best - or its pace of technological innovation - glacial - are at the forefront of horology. They aren’t. That said, when it comes to marketing and creating brand awareness, Rolex is second to none.
If my life depended on the reliability of a watch, I would pick a Rolex before a Patek, FP Journe, A. Lange & Söhne or you name it. That said, I adore my SMP 300.
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Caliber561
·IMO, the only way for Omega to regain its prestigious status is to claim its independence from the Swatch Group.
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bananapeanut
·Omega merged with Tissot and Lemania to form SSIH in the 1920s-'30s. Being part of a larger group was a large reason why Omega was as successful as it was in the 20th century. The perception that a firm must produce inferior products due to being part of a conglomerate or having public offerings is ultimately just a misguided assumption.
I'm not necessarily concerned about the inferiority of the product, more with all the gimmicks that came from the Swatch group: the unlimited number of limited editions, the Bond watches and the TinTin, the Snoopy and then the MoonSwatch. Hard to take the brand seriously. It was like when Rolex made watches with a Dominos Pizza logo on the dial. Pure nonsense. I wish the Swatch Group had more respect for what the Omega brand represents, that's where I was going. It's like the Ultraman, the original was cool and subtle. In the new one, they had to insert the shape of the character or whatever in a subdial. Also, it's great that Bond wears an Omega, but don't write 007 on the watch. It's ridiculous! Would Aston Martin write 007 on the back of their cars? Would Audi make a limited edition Iron Man / Tony Stark version of the Audi R8? They know better. As a brand, what message do you want to convey: the watch/car makes the man or the man makes the watch/car ? Is Bond great because he wears an Omega or is Omega great because Bond wears one?
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Scarecrow Boat
·It was like when Rolex made watches with a Dominos Pizza logo on the dial.
Rolex chose to do this… all on their own
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JwRosenthal
·Rolex put the Dominos logo on the dial because they were paid to.
Rolex chose to do this… all on their own
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bananapeanut
·Can’t forget the 0 in front of the 5 on the new Airking- stroke of design and engineering genius!
05 is still less redundant than 007
