
There's no such thing as a free watch (2017) - tomkinstinch
https://www.topic.com/there-s-no-such-thing-as-a-free-watch
======
LeoPanthera
See also this spoof guide from the "watches" subreddit, "How to create a
unique/successful minimalist watchbrand":

[https://imgur.com/a/6CNO8](https://imgur.com/a/6CNO8)

~~~
DenisM
I wish it talked more about the actual logistics of manufacturing the watch.
Is there a factory in china that will take your design and ship you a box of
made watches?

I just might be tempted to make a limited run.

~~~
simlevesque
Check on Alibaba for something similar and contact the seller.

------
redial
This companies are no different than any other company in the history of
business.

The only thing I can think of is the fact that in this case you can easily
track the supplier and find out the "original price" of the item in a way that
is very hard to do for let's say a pair of Nike shoes, but that's about it.
Walmart is also full of these watches and you can believe they don't sell them
for $5.

Or do you really think it costs Dell exactly $679,95 to build a laptop on one
of their entirely owned factories where they manufacture and store every
single component that goes into it? And, if you call them now they even give
you a $200 discount because wouldn't you know it they just happened to have a
"promotion" just for you?

There is no such thing as a free anything, yet when Apple offers FREE BEATS
WITH EVERY MAC PURCHASE no magazine would dare to call them out on the obvious
fact that both of these items are so "overpriced" that they can even afford to
give one away "for free" and still come out ahead. They instead run "articles"
praising what a great value the offer is and also you should act now before
the sale is over.

This "article" could be written about any company, literally any company.

~~~
Spivak
I think there's a difference between a company selling their goods at a profit
and this not-quite-scam where a popup company not-quite-lies to their
customers and dropships cheap products from somewhere else.

~~~
redial
What do you think Apple does every time someone buys from their online store?
They even give you a tracking number where you can follow the item _in real
time_ all the way from the FoxConn factory in CHINA directly to your door. It
never even flys over Cupertino. I think you are gonna be very surprised when
you find out how the commodities trade actually work.

Walmart sells the exact same watches. So does Amazon. Do you think they are a
not-quite-scam too?

Keep in mind people are actually getting real watches. I don't know in what
world that wouldn't make it a legitimate enterprise. And if you say it's
because of their marketing, then you should really take a look at the copy on
some car ads one day. Preferably Tesla.

~~~
stephen_g
You seem to have severely missed the point. Everbody knows that Apple
manufactures their products in China. Everybody knows their supply chain ships
them from warehouses around the world without ever visiting the US. That is
nothing to do with any of this!

What the article is describing is as if Apple didn't design their own
products, but instead shipped a barely working unbranded $16 android phone
straight from an Alibaba seller when you tried to order an iPhone.

It's true that Amazon and Wallmart etc. have done sort-of this kind of thing
for a long time (but slightly higher quality goods), but there's a huge
difference between this and actual genuine proprietary goods. And even with
Wallmart and Amazon, they don't usually make up a brand story to try and make
buyers thinking they're getting a unique product from a high quality boutique
designer and then selling them broken mass-produced trash.

~~~
redial
You are missing my point.

Every company does this, even Apple. Every company outsources designs to third
parties or buys the rights to an already made product to sell as their own.
Apple does it with cables and maybe most famously the Apple branded iMac vesa
mount. I'm sure they do it with other non core stuff too.

Entire car companies are nothing but rebadged models from another
sister/partner brand. And oh boy you should read the heritage stories of those
ghost brands. Audi takes a Porsche SUV, makes a few tweaks and boom, new Q7.
Do they say that on their marketing or do they talk about how they spent years
studying the needs of a family to be able to balance it with the desire for
power and performance? Or how they finally achieved the perfect balance of
sportiness and practicality?

Hasselblad and Leica, renowned for their photographic history and iconic
designs sell nothing but rebadged cameras at the low end, at double the price
of their counterparts of course. Do they redirect to Sony or Panasonic on
their marketing pages?

Almost the entire fashion and makeup industries are like this.

These guys have bad quality control, ok, I'll give you that, but that just
means they are bad at business. And It is not like their watches were such a
fire hazard that all had to be banned from even entering an airplane.

------
teachrdan
I chatted briefly with the author of this piece, who said that apparently the
only people making money on these watches are online "marketing gurus" who
will teach you how to get rich selling free watches.

~~~
LargeWu
It's absolutely true. I sell screen printed t-shirts that I design and print
myself, as a hobby, and as such I spend some time trying to improve my sales.
The facebook group I'm part of is lousy with people trying to sell these same
cheap watches, jewelry, etc., complaining that they can get lots of traffic
via Instagram but no sales. I would wager 50% of them at least will never make
a single sale. The rest might make a few sales but never come close to a
positive ROI.

------
benj111
I like the screenshotted (shat?) conversation.

Customer> I can buy this watch for $2 elsewhere.

Retailer> Then why are you here?

On some level, yes they're selling overpriced rubbish, but then everyone else
is, especially in fashion. Their sin seems to be making it explicit.

How long before people are buying these watches to make post modern
'statements'?

~~~
sneakernets
> How long before people are buying these watches to make post modern
> 'statements'?

I'm sure that's already a thing, sadly.

------
chaostheory
> J. Crew now uses the brand for a line of high-end women’s clothing. Its
> marketing draws heavily on the age of the original Madewell, and J. Crew is
> fond of including “since 1937” under the logo. This is part of a larger
> effort to portray the Madewell brand in retrospect as a venerable, solid
> company known for craftsmanship and quality.

This is a really old strategy for getting credibility. Some scholars believe
that Sun Tzu's Art of War is really much younger than what is claimed in the
book. They believe that Sun Tzu focused on the book's supposed age and
history, in order to give it more credibility.

------
rmason
Why is it that each generation needs to relearn that there is no free
anything?

In my grandfathers day it was a free lunch. Today a free watch and tomorrow a
free light saber perhaps?

~~~
avip
My grandfather used to say "it's too cheap, we can't afford it".

~~~
antongribok
My father used to say: "We're not rich enough to buy cheap things."

------
1zee
a relevant aside, the Reply All podcast episode on drop-shipping is a great
listen

~~~
CharlesW
This one? [https://www.gimletmedia.com/reply-all/117-the-worlds-most-
ex...](https://www.gimletmedia.com/reply-all/117-the-worlds-most-expensive-
free-watch)

~~~
unpwn
yeah thats the one

------
owenversteeg
I love this! I commented on this article about my own experience starting a
"watch business" when it was originally posted about a year ago and it seemed
to get a decent amount of votes and attention so I figure I'll re-post it
below:

[original w/comments:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15158422](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15158422)]

\-----

So a few years back I started a watch company in a similar way.

I think I was actually one of the first to do it, since when I started I
couldn't find many competitors. I tried a million kinds of promotions, from
"free, you just pay for shipping" to offering people discounts and referral
codes.

I actually created my own watch designs (well, modifications of the face,
case, and strap with the same Chinese movement.) Some of my improvements
started to be used by the manufacturers.

I'm not at all invested in it anymore: I left the business after selling a
substantial, but not massive number of watches and finding that it wasn't
terribly profitable if you included the cost of advertising, shipping, and
(most importantly) my own time.

My own "watch company" was more real in a few ways: watches that I did in fact
design myself, shipped from my address in the US, and the quality of the
watches was actually quite good. To this day I wear a watch from my company
and it has held up to an incredible amount of abuse. I say this as someone who
(used to) collect watches. I also was upfront about the cost of shipping and
the watch itself - I might have, for example, a banner that says "Free 3-Day
US Shipping" and then the price of the watch would be clearly labeled as $20,
so people would know that they would only be paying a total of $20 for the
watch. The prices varied a lot over time, from $10 to $40 per watch, but
surprisingly my profit was never huge even though I only spent about $3 on the
watch itself and $7 on shipping.

If anyone's curious about the whole thing (and lives in the Netherlands) I
still have hundreds of these watches and I'd be happy to sit down over a
coffee, tell my stories from the business and show the watches. (My email's in
my profile.)

\----

A few comments I'd like to add now, in 2018:

1) the watches (mine & that of other "companies") are of a surprisingly high
quality in many cases. Not always, but often. For example, my watch has
survived everything from bilge fluids to boiling water and it's the same cheap
one I sold. Definitely far more durable than a comparable mechanical watch. I
can see myself still using this thing 10+ years down the line. Furthermore, it
actually does look classy and I get compliments on it. Most of the time, if
you buy a cheap $3 Chinese alternative to something that's normally 10-1000x
the price, it is neither beautiful nor durable.

2) The unexpectedly high quality of the watches is what fueled the explosion
of sites IMO. You don't see "free earbuds", "free clock", or "free keyboard"
sites, despite the fact that all 3 of these things are available for under $5
shipped from China. What I think happened is that people bought a watch on a
whim, then it arrived and they realized "wow, this feels like a premium
product!" Which it did! I was blown away when I first saw the quality level
and instantly thought I should start a business. I suspect hundreds of other
people had this same "eureka!" moment. When you get a $5 Aliexpress keyboard,
it feels and looks like it cost $5 to make, and it excites nobody.
Furthermore, Amazon makes a $13 keyboard with great reviews, and being Amazon
it ships with Prime instead of "30-to-infinity day slow-boat-from-China
shipping." Meanwhile, these watches felt like they cost at least $20 to make,
and the only competitors for classy analog watches would be $50-100 or so, but
they cost $3 (drop)shipped!

3) I highly doubt anyone made much money. When I started, dropshipping was not
a thing the manufacturers offered (probably the reason why I was one of the
first.) When manufacturers started offering dropshipping, these "businesses"
exploded because you could suddenly run them entirely behind a laptop. The
problem, of course, was that the number of such "companies" exploded, all
competing for the same customers, Facebook ads, Google results, "underground
marketing" spots, etc etc. That led to people getting a bit suspicious. If you
saw one ad for a cool watch, maybe you were interested, but if you saw 20 in a
week, all suspiciously similar, you'd think something's up.

~~~
boldslogan
It would be cool to hear your quick thoughts on the DW watch brand. I saw
another post talking about the quality being not so good.

~~~
owenversteeg
DW is a totally different thing from these companies. I'd guess that DW's
watches cost them each maybe $10 or so and selling for $80-200, vs. these
watches costing $2-3 and "selling" for $10. They're not dropshipped, use
different manufacturers than these companies and are generally upfront about
the price (although you can get DW watches for far less than MSRP.)

DW's watches are naturally higher quality as well, although in my opinion this
isn't worth the price tag. You can get Chinese "copies" of DW watches for
$10-20 or so that are nearly identical. I wouldn't exactly recommend them, but
to be honest I don't think the quality would be that bad, and they do
generally look nice. That said, I think that even if you're not willing to go
the Aliexpress route you can find an attractive alternative for maybe half the
price.

Watch snobs (I am one) would never wear a DW watch, but most people aren't
watch snobs. If you want watch snob opinions, you can check out the great
/r/watches (caution, you may get drawn to mechanical watches from the
beautiful photos... an expensive hobby to have)

[https://www.reddit.com/r/Watches/comments/7jw3l1/daniel_well...](https://www.reddit.com/r/Watches/comments/7jw3l1/daniel_wellington_are_these_actually_poor_quality/)

[https://www.reddit.com/r/Watches/comments/8n40p8/question_da...](https://www.reddit.com/r/Watches/comments/8n40p8/question_daniel_wellington_ugh_what_have_i_done/)

------
mti27
>Instagram-savvy version of the fake watches one sees being hawked on the
sidewalks of tourist cities.

I bought a "Tagheuer" watch on the streets of NYC for five dollars. At a
glance, it looked OK but by the end of a day's wear it had completely self
destructed.

~~~
kwhitefoot
I bought a 'Cartier' ladies quartz watch on the street in Bangkok for my wife
twenty years ago for five USD and it still works. The band has lost some of
its black colour but apart from that it works perfectly, keeps good time, and
looks pretty good.

Don't know it it is true but the movement inside claims to be Swiss.

------
rezmason
Says you!

[http://freegoldwatch.com/newhome/home.html](http://freegoldwatch.com/newhome/home.html)

[https://www.google.com/maps/@37.7680459,-122.4526923,2a,75y,...](https://www.google.com/maps/@37.7680459,-122.4526923,2a,75y,187.74h,73.27t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sEYfaaHp7FjZEqdPOb2lzgw!2e0!7i13312!8i6656)

------
jboles
This is like the 2010’s equivalent of getting ‘white vanned’.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_van_speaker_scam](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_van_speaker_scam)

------
neogodless
Seems to pop up every once in a while.

Previous discussion:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15154934](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15154934)

------
pvarangot
Dropshipping from China has a bad reputation but it can be done correctly and
ethically. You can say you manufacture and ship from your partners in China,
and you can pay for modifications, better QA like with stickers and number
engraving and traceability, tracking in the shipment... even for some
certified ISO processes.

Not defending what this fake stuff brands are doing, and they not only exist
for watches but also for jewelry, leather bracelets, etc, etc... but just
saying it's also comparable to what cheap shopping mall brands sometimes do
with accessories and watches but adding renting and expensive place in the
middle and marking up everything way more.

~~~
JetSpiegel
> Dropshipping (...) can be done correctly and ethically

"Ethical dropshipping" is the new baroque simplicity.

------
nithi2023
You guys didn't know about freedom phone scam happened in India :D

------
tomatotomato37
From 19:

    
    
      Feels and is a scam. Worst ever. I live in SF where it "claims to be" Why the hell is my shipment coming from Shanghai? 
      Going to miss my girlfriends gift date. WASTE of MONEY!
    

What kind of person gifts their girlfriend a free watch

~~~
bartread
Somebody who's pretty short of cash, I imagine.

------
dang
Url changed from
[http://www.jennyodell.com/museumofcapitalism_freewatch.pdf](http://www.jennyodell.com/museumofcapitalism_freewatch.pdf)
to a non-pdf version.

------
csours
TANSTAAFL

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/There_ain%27t_no_such_thing_as...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/There_ain%27t_no_such_thing_as_a_free_lunch)

Also, people will pay more for a good story.

\---

> "25\. Maybe this explains what’s so galling to people about the Folsom & Co.
> not-really-scam: It simply lays bare the categorical deception at the heart
> of all branding and retail. The different watch values are, in the strictest
> sense, speech acts: the watch is $29.99 because someone said it’s $29.99.
> It’s $29.99 because a certain person is wearing it on Instagram; it’s $29.99
> because it’s photographed next to flannel and a Chemex. While “Bradley” of
> “Bradley’s men’s shop” may not be the most fleshed-out character, he – and
> the entire existence of Folsom & Co., Soficoastal, etc. – are examples of
> the now-household term, “brand storytelling.” And the internet makes it
> possible for anyone to tell any story, about anything, from anywhere."

\---

> " thateffingasian: Capitalism is making your own product and selling it.
> Capitalism isn't buying a piece of shit and telling people they're worth 25x
> the price, and lying to them about the actual value of the product. Your
> idea of capitalism is fucked up @soficoastal. Then the idiots blocked me,
> LOL. "

If Capitalism isn't buying shit and lying about it to sell it for higher, I
don't know what Capitalism is. This is only a difference in degree, not kind.

~~~
timr
_" If Capitalism isn't buying shit and lying about it to sell it for higher, I
don't know what Capitalism is. This is only a difference in degree, not
kind."_

I'm neutral on the question in this case, but really, any discussion of
"capitalism" that goes beyond chapter one, page one of an undegrad economics
textbook covers the point that efficient markets are not deceptive markets.
Participants are assumed to share equal information. HN's understanding of
capitalist theory seems to begin and end at the phrase, "supply and demand",
and everything that has a two-sided market is otherwise A-OK.

In this particular case, consumers are sort-of informed, but it's also a lot
harder to be informed than it used to be. I'm someone who _tries_ to find
high-quality items, and even I screw up on a regular basis. I wouldn't fall
for this one, though.

~~~
WalterBright
> Participants are assumed to share equal information.

That is not a requirement for efficiency. Unknowns are factored into the price
as "risk".

For example, if I am selling you my car, I know its condition a lot better
than you do. But, the more you are suspicious about its condition, the less
you are willing to pay for it.

If you're a crackerjack programmer, my interview process is inexact, so I'm
going to discount the salary offer based on how risky it is that you're not a
crackerjack.

Sellers offer guarantees in order to reduce the customer's risk, and hence be
able to sell at a higher price. Investment returns are based on the riskiness
of it. I pay more at the post office for less risk of non-delivery. Insurance
companies, of course, are an entire industry based on managing risk.

Risk is a perfectly normal characteristic of efficient markets, perfect or
equal information is not required at all.

~~~
timr
_" That is not a requirement for efficiency. Unknowns are factored into the
price as "risk"."_

If someone is lying to you and you have no way of knowing it, there's no way
to price the risk. Dishonesty can never be _eliminated_ (that's software
engineer pedantry) but it's always a drag on efficiency. People who don't
trust each other don't engage in trade.

 _" Risk is a perfectly normal characteristic of efficient markets, perfect or
equal information is not required at all."_

Risk is a normal characteristic; there are always things you can't measure.
Deception is not normal. It's why "capitalism" as practiced in countries where
there are no stable legal systems tends to have lower levels of growth.

~~~
starbeast
>People who don't trust each other don't engage in trade.

You are going to need one hell of a citation for that claim, or you are using
some new definition of 'trust' that I have not previously encountered.

~~~
timr
Saying "citation needed" doesn't work when it's one of the fundamentals of the
field. But hey, Hackernews, I'll google it for you:

[https://www.jstor.org/stable/41638856?seq=1#page_scan_tab_co...](https://www.jstor.org/stable/41638856?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents)

[http://econ.sciences-
po.fr/sites/default/files/file/yann%20a...](http://econ.sciences-
po.fr/sites/default/files/file/yann%20algan/HB_FinalVersion1.pdf)

[https://voxeu.org/article/trust-and-economic-
development](https://voxeu.org/article/trust-and-economic-development)

[https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/f7e3/e958b4b7387707a5ae32fa...](https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/f7e3/e958b4b7387707a5ae32fa34a6a7565e1de1.pdf)

[https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2906280](https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2906280)

[http://www.oecd.org/innovation/research/1825662.pdf](http://www.oecd.org/innovation/research/1825662.pdf)

[https://www.parisschoolofeconomics.eu/IMG/pdf/Huck2.pdf](https://www.parisschoolofeconomics.eu/IMG/pdf/Huck2.pdf)

I stopped midway down the first page. But this quote is great, so I'll include
it:

 _" Conjoint action is possible just in proportion as human beings can rely on
each other. There are countries in Europe, of first-rate industrial
capabilities, where the most serious impediment to conducting business
concerns on a large scale, is the rarity of persons who are supposed fit to be
trusted with the receipt and expenditure of large sums of money."_

\- John Stuart Mill, Principles of Political Economy, 1848

~~~
starbeast
Caveat Emptor - Chandelor v Lopus (1603)

edit - there is a core difference in definitions of trust going on here and it
is basically the difference between the list of people you would lend money to
vs the list of people you would buy something from. For certain trades, these
lists are essentially the same, but for other trades they are very, very
different.

------
CapacitorSet
We really do live in a dystopia.

~~~
Empact
If scammy, semi-fraudulent watch sites constitute our dystopia, I’m relieved.

These scams are as old as commerce. Just more easily propagated using modern
tools. They’re the reason Consumer Reports and reveiw publications exist.
Caveat emptor.

