Rolex responded by upping production of the Submariner, GMT Master and Daytona, but adhered to only making incremental mechanical improvements and modest tweaks to the original designs. Trends in dress watches began shifting rapidly in the s, and Rolex did nearly nothing to respond, keeping most models as recognizable as ever.
We can say the same for Rolex Oysterquartz models, which appeared in the s. Whenever Rolex followed a trend, they produced relatively forgettable watches. When Rolex stuck to their core designs, they made what have become some of the most collectible and popular timepieces. Or perhaps Rolex, like most luxury brands, is using scarcity to build an aura of exclusivity around their brand.
The result of Rolex not meeting market demand for their most famous professional steel watches has resulted in years-long waitlists at authorized dealers. Most dealers will put your name on the list, but if pressed for their selection process, it appears that in most cases the dealer will privilege their most loyal customers read: those who spend the most , while a newcomer will most likely never get the call. Rolex Yacht-Master 42 mm Courtesy of Rolex. It would have been solid-gold Day-Dates and Datejusts that went with a suit or evening gown.
The irony mushrooms, as many watch aficionados express boredom with expensive gold Rolexes while heralding anyone who can obtain, say, a recent GMT Master in steel. The other result of Rolex shorting the market for their steel professional models has been escalating prices on the secondary market. Flipping these watches is a faux pas with authorized dealers, who vet their customers as best they can to weed out flippers. Such a claim would cast these folks in an exclusive light among the right crowd.
Clearly shorting this market has been working for Rolex, who could certainly bump up production of these models and sell them like hotcakes. But anyone who has walked into an authorized Rolex dealer and asked if they could get a steel Sky-Dweller or GMT Master will experience the ineffable aura of exclusivity that this practice wraps around the retail experience.
Being eternally in vogue, more than anything, has assured that Rolex will remain king for the foreseeable future. Plus, get digital edition access and a free tote bag. Travel Destinations Hotels Resorts Spas. RR One. Search Close. Give the Gift of Luxury. Access Exclusive Content All Year.
RR One Subscribe. By Allen Farmelo. Allen Farmelo. Photo: Courtesy of Rolex. Like this article? Get the Robb Report newsletter for similar stories delivered straight to your inbox.
Subscribe Today! In , the Crown upgraded to the GMT Master II — a new movement and slimmer case turned out to be big hits as steel and gold models asserted a pitch-perfect jet setting attitude. Plenty of folks knew to rock a Rolex Submariner for maximum panache, but rocking a GMT Master II was a slyly stylish move that demonstrated the owner's uniqueness. Since then, it's been all about metal and color combos, which are judiciously and painfully released at a rate of about one a year, at best.
However, the "Batman" blue and black , "Pepsi" blue and red , and "Rootbeer" brown and beige have all been released to great applause. Before the s, Rolex housed third-party chronograph movements in Oyster cases. Then the company upped the case size, redesigned the dial and put out the space-age sounding "Cosmograph.
Though not to much fanfare Paul Newman's wife bought him one with a creamy Bauhaus-inspired dial — now called the "Newman" dial — and the famed actor casually gave it to his son-in-law sometime in the s. The auction transformed what was already becoming an increasingly coveted watch into a crazed run on all Daytonas, old and new.
Now you can hardly get one at retail, especially in all stainless steel, and the used market for Daytonas of any era in any style or metal with any dial has gone completely berserk. Like so many steel Professional models, the Daytona remains in-demand and sells above retail on the secondhand market — a remarkable result for what was initially an unremarkable watch. As SCUBA matured beyond surface-level military and recreational uses, commercial, research, and exploratory techniques were developed for going deeper for longer.
The Sea-Dweller was Rolex's answer to the demands for watches capable of withstanding the pressure of these deeper dives. In upon its initial release, the Sea-Dweller was rated to a depth of 4, feet 1, meters. In a newer Sea-Dweller was rated to 12, feet 3, meters , at the time a record-breaking figure. The Sea-Dweller is essentially a beefed-up Submariner, but that beefing up shouldn't be taken lightly: Rolex had to entirely re-engineer the case, the crystal, the case back and more to get this kind of water resistance, so while the Sea-Dweller resembles the Submariner on the outside, the guts are a different animal.
Waterproofness in nano-scale wristwatches has turned out to provide useful tech that can be ported over to small submarines, cameras, and other scientific tools that are plumbing the depths of our largely unexplored oceans.
Rolex often backs those scientific expeditions, linking the watch and the brand to the essence of professional SCUBA diving. This watch had already existed for over two decades as the Oyster Perpetual when Rolex sent one up Mt.
Everest with Sir Edmund Hillary's team for the first successful summiting in After that, Rolex rearranged the dial somewhat, printed "Explorer" on it, and sold it to a new wave of midcentury mountaineering enthusiasts.
The Explorer went on to become an "entry-level" Rolex sport model, due only to price, and remains in that position to this day. Like all Rolex models, the Explorer has gone through many permutations, including more modern iterations like the , now popular among vintage collectors because its tritium luminescence has finally turned beige.
Rolex upped the case size with the release of the 39mm Explorer, though since the Explorer is back down to 36mm, indicating that the trend toward smaller watches is quite real today.
In , Rolex shocked us with a two-tone model, bringing gold to the lineup for the first time. A spelunking watch? That's right. The boldly luminescent hour GMT hand was included to help those living in caves keep track of day and night. While spelunking isn't exactly a popular sport, the Explorer II became a rather popular watch among those who love a cool design and GMT functionality. Offered today with either a black or white "polar" dial, the Explorer II came out in in order to "perpetuate the privileged relationship Rolex shares with exploration," according to current marketing materials.
However, the spelunking history is largely forgotten as the watch increasingly serves as a tool for adventurers of all kinds. The more recent editions — unlike the original — feature fully functional GMT movements, so the watches can be used for tracking second time zones.
Though the Explorer II went from a tasty 40mm case up to a 42mm "maxi" case in , the reference was intended to celebrate the original design of , which amounts to an orange GMT hand in the "correct" shape.
Those two extra millimeters don't feel significant on the wrist, however, and only seem significant when compared directly with a 40mm model. In , when the Milgauss came out, the world was abuzz with nuclear research, especially at places like CERN, still the most advanced particle accelerator. Meanwhile, all the incredible technology developed during WWII was being ported to commercial uses, making electrical engineers one of the most important professional groups on the planet at the time.
Rolex gave them what they needed, a watch able to withstand 1, "mil" gauss a measure of electromagnetic fields. Sadly, scientists and engineers aren't the famous heroes they ought to be, and the Milgauss is the only current Rolex model to go out of production, from to However, when the watch returned in , it was a rather exciting surprise for Rolex enthusiasts, and the lightning bolt seconds hand remains the most playful feature of any Rolex model to date.
The modern version isn't entirely impossible to get your hands on at retail, and more than any other Rolex model the Milgauss is the most likely to help you stand out in a crowd. It is, for sure, a watch for those in the know. Like The Explorer, the Air King had existed as the Oyster Perpetual for a long while before Rolex printed "Air King" on the dial and began marketing it to a new set of post-WWII jet setters — men who adored and imitated the former war pilots now flying jumbo jets across the Atlantic.
Subscriber Account active since. When watch aficionado Adam Golden stopped into his local Rolex dealer's shop in Florida this summer, there was just a solitary ladies' Datejust in the case available for sale.
Had the customer who originally ordered it not changed their mind, there would have been zero, he said. Rolex reportedly makes close to a million watches per year, and advertisements are almost everywhere, but actually finding one to buy can prove to be an exercise in futility. Its watches have always been expensive, but the scarcity and pricing today are a far cry from the days when distributors had plenty of inventory to sell at more negotiable prices, according to Jeffrey Hess, a Rolex collector and the co-author of Rolex Wristwatches: An Unauthorized History.
Hess said the 's marked a turning point in the company's public image, during which the brand went from being an essential precision tool for professionals and adventurers to become the highly prized luxury collectible it is today. It was meant to be a watch for swimmers, submariners, explorers.
Indeed, for much of the Twentieth Century, Rolex under its founder Hans Wilsdorf was at the cutting edge of horological innovation. From the radical idea to put a clock on a wrist, to plunging it into the English Channel, to summiting Mount Everest, to clocking land speed records, the brand emphasized utility and reliability above all else.
We are in the luxury business. True to form, the brand boosted its visibility with placements in Hollywood films, sporting event sponsorships, and philanthropic awards. It also instituted a tighter grip on its supply, which enabled it to increase quality controls and maintain an allure of scarcity. By the 's, these efforts to project an image of reliability and stability put Rolex in prime position to be a safe store of value during economic uncertainty.
For example, the US abandoned the gold standard for the dollar in , in Italy tightened its control of the Lira, and in an oil crisis sent the market reeling. The Italians were the first to embrace the vintage Rolex business, Hess said, because watches were a stable and portable alternative to currency during this period.
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