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<\/p>\nThings were different when I started collecting watches back in the early 1980s, for a start, you could walk into any Rolex dealership and buy pretty much any watch you wanted right off the shelf. And, if you were lucky \u2013 or just persistent, you could probably even get a discount. Also, the used Rolex business was very different, it existed not to provide hard-to-get models at a premium but to supply people who wanted a Rolex but couldn\u2019t afford a brand-new one.<\/p>\n
But the problems facing the used Rolex dealer were the same as today \u2013 where to obtain watches to sell, back then lots came from the grey market, retailers who had been sitting on stock for a long time were often happy to get rid of it at a tiny profit. Or when a nation\u2019s currency collapsed, grey market dealers would swoop in with hard currency and empty the stores \u2013 I remember this happening during the Far Eastern economic crisis of the 1990s and during the Icelandic economic collapse a decade later.<\/p>\n
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But in London there was one other source: the Middle East \u2013 back then, visitors and expatriates headed to Grey\u2019s Market (near Bond Street tube station), where there was a warren of small shops selling antiques and used watches. Many of these visitors brought with them watches which they had been given by members of various Royal Families in the region; these watches invariably had special dials featuring the crest of the donor. These watches were quietly exchanged for envelopes of \u00a350 notes; the watches would then be sent to local jewellers, and the dials were removed and replaced with standard production dials. And there is another difference: back then you could walk into the London Rolex service centre in Stratford Place and buy as many dials as you wanted. The special dials with the crests would be unceremoniously thrown in the trash.<\/p>\n
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But the biggest difference is that those watches with the crested dial which have survived are now worth between three to ten times the value of those with the replaced dials.
\nIt\u2019s worth remembering this \u2013 in life, the only thing which remains constant \u2013 is change.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"