Swatch watches arise when the Swiss watch manufacturers begun losing the market share they previously had. A crisis began in which a great chunk of the traditional manufacturers bowed down and declared themselves bankrupt and others moved to luxury watches manufacturing.

Swiss Watches For The Masses?
The dream of Swiss watches for the masses seemed over and buried. In 1983 though the miracle named Swatch emerged. The basic principle behind their selling policy was that if the watches had the right price, buyers would prefer a made in Switzerland watch.

Swiss Quality At Affordable Prices
The basic mean of reducing costs was to make the manufacturing process fully automated, use cheaper materials and keep the design simple. In fact a Swatch is an example of minimalism by using only 51 components. Compare that with a traditional watch which has a least 100 and you will begin to see the whole picture. As a matter of fact a Swatch watch has a cost making which is 5 time smaller than that of a traditional watch

Short History

Soon after their launch Swatch watches took over the world. In 1984 they managed to sell 2.3 millions of them. In the mid 80’s they took over United States with those infamous Swatch stores. Sky seemed to be the limit.

They were fashionable and cheap. Their fashionability soon had though a boomerang effect and soon after these watches came out of fashion. Nonetheless their sales are rather high to this date and the Swatch company is the biggest manufacturer of its kind in the world.

Contrary to popular belief the name Swatch in itself does not derive from “Swiss watch”, but from “second watch”. This company grasped the moment when pop culture was at its height and became an integral part of it. A Swatch watch is a disposable one. Nothing reflects better this thinking than their early success.

The 90’s came though and a new sense of welfare was established. The irrational exuberance of the 80’s was over once for all. Swatch attempted to change their image accordingly without much success though.

As the company moved on into the new millennium, the acute need of finding the authentic and original in everything we buy found its way in the corporate thinking of the Swatch executives. Nowadays Swatch watches may appear where you don’t expect them as the group purchased a lot of Swiss luxury brands. The quest for cheap watches is hopefully over, the quest for quality has just started.