Scottish Watches Podcast #757 : Why We Buy Watches And How Brands Get Inside Our Mind Featuring Helene

Summary

---

Scottish Watches Podcast #757: Why We Buy Watches and How Brands Get Inside Our Mind Featuring Helene

Date: March 2, 2026
Length: ~57 min
Host: Scottish Watches
Guest: Dr. Helene Duvall – Consumer Psychologist, Watch Collector

---

Episode Overview

This engaging episode dives into the psychological reasons behind why we buy watches, how brands influence our decisions, and what makes timepieces more than just objects that tell time. Dr. Helene Duvall, a consumer psychologist and avid collector, joins from Canada to unravel the ways marketing, psychology, and emotion intertwine in watch collecting. Together, the hosts and guest explore personal collecting journeys, the role of iconic brands, the power of scarcity, and the persistent allure of stories that animate every watch we wear.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Guest Introduction and Collecting Origins

• [00:28] Dr. Helene Duvall: Introduces herself as a French-Canadian consumer psychologist and lifelong “watch person.”
  • Collects many things—fountain pens, comics, chocolate, and especially watches.
  • “I own too many watches for normal people. I have a small, reasonable collection for, you know, the people like us.” [01:10]
• Collector Roots:
  • Grew up in a watch-loving family, especially influenced by her father.
  • Started with Swatches as a teen; maintains affection for funky, affordable pieces (e.g., 2000 Sydney Olympics Swatch still running) [06:37].

2. The Power of Influence and Hype

• Wrist Check: [01:42] Helene is currently wearing a vintage Omega Polaris—her ebay find spurred by influencer coverage:
  • “[S]uddenly there were 67 people watching it. And of course, it was tied to the fact that someone had talked about those watches...That kind of kicked my butt into stop watching them and just getting one before people just decided they were cool.”
• Influencer Effect: Touches on how watch prices and attention can skyrocket after media exposure—parallels with other collectibles like video games. [03:01-05:31]

3. Journey to “Serious” Watches

• Milestone Purchases:
  • Gave herself a mechanical watch for her 40th birthday—a Black Bay 58, coincidentally chosen by her father for his retirement. [09:15]
  • Ultimately “needed” a Rolex as a psychological and collector’s milestone (“milestone brand”). [11:23]
    • On Iconic Brands: “There is something incredibly hard to be that brand, to be the point of reference for everybody...it’s not based on value, it’s going to be based on image.” [12:18]
  • Acquired an Oyster Perpetual after befriending her local AD.

4. Big Brands, Scarcity, and Perceived Value

• Rolex, Montblanc, Ray-Ban as "default" luxury choices—offering peace of mind to buyers new to a category. [11:57]
  • “Even if you don’t know, you know that brand.” – Helene [12:18]
• Scarcity and Hype:
  • The psychological impact of scarcity (“fear of missing out”)—applied to the rise of the Moonswatch [24:30]
  • “People...went after it because if it was difficult to get, it was valuable...the only reason why it was this valuable is because not everybody can get one.” [24:51]

5. Consumer Psychology: How Brands Get In Our Heads

• Mental Shortcuts (“Herd Mentality”) [21:58]
  • People rely on popularity as a shortcut for quality/value: “We purchase a lot of things by using shortcuts...we are going to vouch for one that has 3 million views...it’s not always a bad shortcut.” – Helene [22:51]
  • Reciprocity: Humans feel obligated when a brand “does something nice.” [35:06]
• Scarcity as Motivator:
  • E.g., “limited window” ordering versus fixed-number drops—a tool to nudge immediate purchase decisions. [37:13–39:28]
  • “It does seem to apply everywhere now. I do believe that some brands are playing a little bit too much the scarcity game...At this point, I think you’re going to start building some resentment that will exceed the desirability and goodwill you find from it.” – Helene [37:13]

6. Stories and Emotion Over Function

• Watches as emotional artifacts versus mere tools [28:44, 54:41]:
  • “We are in a hobby of liking a technology that’s completely outdated, that has no specific value in terms of what it’s bringing. There are tons of other ways to read time and we are still attached to this thing that is just doing a job that a lot of other tools can do.” – Helene [28:44]
  • Tangible, analog objects retain meaning in a digital world.
  • “It’s a very expensive photo album. That’s what our watch collections are.” – Host [54:41]
• Buying watches while traveling becomes “collecting postcards” (Swatch stores in airports). [54:41-55:32]

7. Trends, Content, and Generational Shifts

• Younger Consumers:
  • In her classroom, more traditional watches than smartwatches; reflects changing trends and counterculture notions. [31:58-32:27]
• Influencer Marketing:
  • Daniel Wellington discussed as “gateway” for younger buyers—trend now waning. [32:27]
• Virality and Fads:
  • Social trends (e.g. NFT, VR) are compared with “Emperor’s New Clothes”—most don’t last. [26:08-27:12]
  • Time-limited or exclusive drops drive urgency, engagement, and sometimes later regret or resentment. [39:28-40:29]

8. Famous People and Watch Value

• The Paul Newman Daytona phenomenon: Sometimes “lightning in a bottle”; not always easily explained or replicable. [47:19–48:11]
  • “Sometimes you catch lightning in a bottle and there is no explaining it. And that’s also what is hard in marketing, right?” – Helene [47:19]
• Celebrity effect: “Just having a celebrity wear something is going to make it more memorable...they are not going after us.” [50:51]
  • Taylor Swift’s vintage Cartier worn during a public proposal sparked a spike in student/eBay interest. [43:35–46:05]

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Collector Mindset:

  “You can’t own too many watches. That’s an impossibility.” – Host [01:00]

• On Aspiration and Brand Power:

  “There is something incredibly hard to be that brand, to be the point of reference for everybody...it’s not based on value, it’s going to be based on image.” – Helene [12:18]

• On Scarcity:

  “At the opposite end, we love to have what we can’t have. And so if something is limited in availability for one reason or another, it makes it more valuable.” – Helene [22:51]

• On Emotional Significance:

  “The hunk of metal is not that important, but the story we tell ourselves really are. And that's how these things work.” – Helene [52:40]

• On Trends Repeating:

  “The world, the norm, society change; human nature doesn’t.” – Helene [42:34]

---

Important Segment Timestamps

• Guest Introduction & Wrist Check: [00:28–05:44]
• Getting Into Watch Collecting: [06:37–11:18]
• The Psychology of Rolex & Milestone Brands: [11:18–14:18]
• Finding Watches that ‘Fit’: Niche & Vintage: [14:18–16:45]
• Most Out There / Quirky Watches: [16:45–19:30]
• Consumer Psychology Principles: [21:09–25:23]
• NFTs & Fads: [25:23–28:15]
• Role of Tangibility & Mechanical Watches: [28:44–31:23]
• Student Watch Trends: [31:58–32:27]
• Marketing ‘Shortcuts’: Scarcity, Reciprocity: [34:45–37:13]
• Time-Limited Drops & Marketing Approaches: [39:28–42:00]
• Virality and ‘Lightning in a Bottle’ (Paul Newman): [47:19–51:59]
• Storytelling & Emotional Connections: [52:40–54:41]
• Swatch at Airports & Collecting Memories: [54:41–55:32]

---

Final Thoughts

This episode is a rich, insightful exploration of what really drives the passion and business of watches. Helene’s academic expertise and enthusiastic storytelling illuminate both what’s on our wrists and what’s in our heads, from herd mentality to deep nostalgia, from iconic marketing to personal milestone purchases.

By the end, listeners will reflect on their own collecting habits, the subtle nudges of “scarcity marketing,” and the often unexplainable magic that makes a simple watch so much more than a way to tell time.

---

Transcript

[A]

Welcome to the Scottish Watches Podcast. This is going to be an excellent episode. Exciting, invigorating, because we've got somebody in the line who has been communicating behind the scenes for a long, long time, probably many multiples of years. Every so often we'd actually read out one of those emails on the show live. But we've coaxed somebody from a far flung place. It's not America this time, it's not Europe this time. Although she was in Europe just quite recently, although her luggage took slightly longer to return home. Do you want to introduce yourself to the audience, mystery guest?

[B]

Hi, my name is Ellen Duvall. I am an act. Actual French person from France, but I do live in Canada, which is the far flung part. I am a consumer psychologist, which means that I have a doctorate in trying to understand how people think and how illogical and irrational we mostly are. And I am a woman of many rabbit holes. So I have a very vast collection of fountain pens, I read comics, I bake a lot of things involving chocolate and more to the purpose of today. I also own too many watches.

[A]

You've already derailed the conversation and lied to the public because you can't own too many watches. That's an impossibility. But you are stretching the fabrics of physics here already from the off.

[B]

Well, I own too many watches for normal people. I have a very small, reasonable collection for, you know, the people like us,

[A]

the special folks that have that want and desire to continuously collect things even though they only have two wrists. And we're going to tell you right at the beginning of the show, cause I remembered is to check the show notes. That's where all the information, the tech spec, the links and the foreground of watches that we discuss and things that take our fancy across the next hour will be located, thanks to Mizzelle. Probably do that wrist check thing at the start of the show as well. So what have you got in the wrist today?

[B]

Today? So my access to my collection is a bit limited because, as you mentioned, I was just traveling. So most of my watches are actually outside the house right now. But I am wearing an old Omega quartz from the 1980s, which is an Omega Polaris, which is an integrated bracelet, which as this version has a very nice creamy dial. A lot of them had darker dials, but I really wanted a light one. It has like gold inlays. It's actually a Gerald Gento design, which I didn't know when I started liking those watches. Yeah, this watch was something that I always had kind of on my watch list. On ebay and was kind of always kind of having a lookout for one of them. And one day I was watching one, and usually there were like, you know, five, 10 people watching those watches, and suddenly there were 67 people watching it. And I'm just like, what's going on there? And of course, it was tied to the fact that someone had talked about those watches. And this time I'm pointing the finger at Time and Tide. They were just said like iconic designs of the 80s. And so that kind of kicked my butt into stop watching them and just getting one before people just decided that they were cool. So, yeah, this one is an ebay find that I bought like a few months. That's a tiny quartz omega from the 80s.

[A]

Very nice. Well, we will talk about the collecting journey because there are many stories that we have passed back and forward about things that have happened in your classroom with people when significant cultural events have unfolded across the globe. And I was just watching a YouTube video that has nothing to do with watches, but again, branching into that Comic Con, comic video game lifestyle that I have as well. There was a chat going on about the collectible video game world and how people were hyping up unboxed, completely sealed vintage Mario games and how the prices just went up and up because people pushed them, influencers pushed them through social media. More people got involved, and the price just skyrocketed. Now it's come back down. So a little bit like Time and Tide managed to get more people watching your watch. It happens everywhere. But we will get into that shortly. It's time for me to do my wrist check. And today I'm wearing a watch that's reminiscent of another watch, but it's extremely cheap. And this is the latest creation from the guys at Nabeo. So this one is called the Orpiter Solar Blades. It is massive. I checked the spec on it. It is 50 mil in diameter. It is just absolutely barbaric on the wrist. Nubeo are part of the Spinnaker conglomerate. They've obviously got AV8, Kadola, many other brands under their wings, but this is their more space age, their more crazy complication department. But you wouldn't be spending crazy amounts of money looking at the top of this. It reminds me of perhaps Tree Lobe, a French brand that we speak about on the show, because they have got lots of different ways of telling the time, but they are horology and they cost a lot of money. This one comes in at less than 1000 bucks because you're getting a lot for your money, in the center you have got the seconds that rotate around slowly as you would expect. Then from there you have got the hours and then from there you have got the minutes. The watch display is read a little bit like an MB and F mad one where the time is told from the 6 o' clock position. There's a little arrow, a little aperture with two little prongs, and in between there you read the time on the downward trajectory. On the back of the watch it has got a clear case back so you can see through to the movement, which is obviously a slightly modified version of the Japanese Seiko. You can't see too much in there because they've decided to decorate and put a Dico color on the aperture in the back on the little window. But this is available in multiple different colorways. Automatic three hander. Well, not three hander, three dialer. And compared to the multiple tens of thousands you would pay for a Swiss made or a French made variation, I think this is pretty good. Even the MAD ones, although they've come down a lot on ebay in the different places like Chrono 24 for less than 1000 bucks in various different colorways. This is definitely something that will stand out and attract a lot of attention on your wrist. We take a look at this one. Is this in your wheelhouse or is

[B]

this like, ugh, it is. Except that I could not wear it because this is obviously a very big watch and I am a lady with a tiny wrist. So I would be a little bit afraid of how big that would look on me. But I love the complete globe and the neon colors. It's pretty funky and fun.

[A]

It's something different. That's what I love about these guys because they will just send us all kinds of random stuff on a monthly basis. Because done collaborations with Spinnaker in the past, potentially might have won later on this year, who knows. But they always do things at a price point that is incredibly low. They don't charge multiple thousands. When you're getting something that stands out. And if it had a different brand name on it, they would be putting zeros in the end of it. Right, let's get into the meat of the matter with the show. You have been emailing in and not being a pest, we like it when people email and we say this all the time. Drop us an email, never DM us. It's good to start a dialogue and a communication with people. And over the years you have done your best to correct Dave and his mispronunciations. I shared, and I'm not going to dox the other person, but I shared some messages where somebody else has been keeping a running tally on Dave's vocabulary and how mispronunciations creep into every single show. But take things back a little bit. Tell us how you got into the watch collecting hobby.

[B]

It's a little bit hard for me to say how I got in because I felt like I was always there. So there have been a few points of inflection. So first, of course, I should mention the fact that the original watch guy in my family is my dad. My dad has always liked watches and there were always, you know, cool watches to look at at home. I'm a Swatch girl to begin with. Like, I, I have bought at least one to two swatches a year since I was a teenager. I still wear some that are not considered vintage because the oldest watch that I still wear is from the 2000 Sydney Olympics. And I still wear that watch and it's still kicking. So I'm at heart, I'm a Swatch girl. Like that's, that's really where this all started and the funky colors, the things you buy to go with your outfit type of mentality. And so I followed Swatch pretty closely. I have the very first irony collection when we started to do metal watches. I have one where the first time they put ceramic on the watch, it's just a bezel and it's nothing fancy, but I have that. I have a first system 51 when they first released it.

[A]

Does it still work?

[B]

It does still work, yeah.

[A]

Oh, right. Because the big thing with that was once they died, they died. There was nothing much you could do. Everything was laser welded.

[B]

Yeah, absolutely. No, but mine is still working. So not that I wear it super often, but it is still kicking. And then in high school, I started to wear a little bit of funkier things. I bought myself the fancy watch I bought. My first fancy ish watch was a Seiko Kinetic. Uh, I really enjoyed. Now the capacitors are completely dead on that thing and that one is not working at all. And I, I like the look of chronographs, even if I couldn't really afford one. So I had a fake chronograph which was like you had the three dials, but they were not doing anything. And so I kind of became like a person who likes watches. So I got a lot of them as gifts as well, which is what, when my parents and my family didn't know what to buy me for a Christmas, a birthday, I would get a watch. So my brother is responsible for probably the funkier one. So, you know, little gold Casio, things of that. Of that nature. So I was always, like, kind of, you know, recognized as a watch person when, you know, I have my great grandmother's pocket watch. Like, there was no contest that if someone was going to get it, it was going to be me, because I was the one who liked watches. And that was. That was part of. Of the deal. Now things accelerated a little bit when I decided to treat myself to a fancy mechanical watch for my 40th birthday. Already had, you know, more moderately priced Seikos and Tito's and things of the sort, but I just decided that I really wanted something a little bit squankier to treat myself for my 40th birthday. So I started to look around, read a little bit more, trying to find information. So kind of six months before the date, I started really collecting information. I didn't want a dive watch. And of course I. I bought a Black Bay 58 because after I realized that a Speedmaster was completely worrying me, it was just too big for me. The Rolex was just not unattainable, but completely elusive. Like, it just was not in the cards. The lady at my local ad was just like, try this on. And she was right. Once I. Once I tried it on, I fell in love with it. And I was just like, okay, yeah, it's. It's. It's good proportions. For me, that works. It makes it pretty sporty. But I just really enjoyed it. And little did I know, I called my dad all proud. This is during the pandemic, so we were not seeing each other. There was an ocean, and I'm just like, okay, Dad, I made a decision. I think I'm gonna buy that Black Bay 58. And he started laughing because he had bought the exact same watch without us talking to each other. So for him, it was his retirement milestone. For me, that was my 40th birthday. But we bought the exact same watch without talking to each other in the same colorway. So that was my first fancy watch. Wow.

[A]

And that is a fantastic story. It shows you that you're perfectly aligned and we find this within the collector community. Folks in the industry, the. There is this meeting of minds, as if we are all linked some way through the universe. And there are many times I've spotted a watch. Simona will look at a similar watch or something. She'll send me an Instagram message. At the same time I'm sending her an Instagram message. And they cross. So that is phenomenal. And how did the collecting hobby kind of grow from there? You said this was your first.

[B]

Yeah, unfortunately, at the last. But so at that point, even if that was not the ultimate goal, I was just like, okay, well, I think I still really want a noise to perpetual. I think I still would like my Rolex.

[A]

Now, why did you want a Rolex? Let's get into the mind of the master here.

[B]

Okay, so there are a few things. As I mentioned, I'm a consumer psychologist, so I study marketing. And Rolex is that symbol of like, the one brand that actually did as good as marketing that they do at watchmaking. And so they are a few milestone brands like this, like, you know, in fountain pens, which is another thing that I collect. You've got Montblanc, and if you go to something and you know you don't. You want a nice pair of sunglasses and you don't really know anything, you buy a pair of Ray Ban. And being that point of reference, if you want a fancy sports car, you buy a Porsche. If you don't know.

[A]

What do you mean, if you don't know?

[B]

No, I'm just saying that even if you don't know, you know that brand. So it doesn't mean that they are bad for inside the collecting community. That just means, I am not attacking your Porsche. It just means that even people who don't know anything about car will know what a 911 is. Even people who don't know anything about watches will know what a Rolex is. People who have never heard of Fontaine Pens will ask me, do you have a Montblanc? They will have heard that brand at some point. And so there is something to be said for those brands that are kind of capturing this whole thing, because it's actually really hard to do. Right. Some people can give crap, which is just like, oh, you buy your. You bought a Rolex, which is like the generic thing for a luxury watch. But there is something incredibly hard to be that brand, to be the point of reference for everybody, which is that you have to deliver. Right. The reason why you are actually known outside the community is because it's not based on value. It's going to be based on image. It's going to be based on aspirational things. And for all the examples I've taken from Ray Ban to Montblanc to Portia, can you find something that will be better value for money? The answer is usually yes, you will find something that's better value for money, but that won't necessarily encapsulate that kind of iconic thing that the brand is standing for. So I was interested in Rolex. You know, it was kind of a lifelong thing. I mentioned I was collecting swatches Since I was 13 and there was always the one day I'll buy myself a Rolex. And there was nothing else that was really scratching that edge. Right. Even if I have other watches that I really, really like and that I have discovered through this journey, that was still kind of a goal, that was still a milestone. That was, that was somewhere in there. And of course it took time. It took me a few years to get the watch that I really wanted. I need to say that I didn't have to play games with my ad. It was like my ad were the nerd people. I stopped by on the way from work to just talk watches with. Like before we had, you know, all those sorts of Instagram and social media to talk about watches. They were my watch nerds. Like it's not so something people say, establish your relationship with your ad. I didn't really fake that one. Like it was just like, oh, I just want to talk to these people who are into this thing that I really like. And so after a couple of years, I did get an Oyster perpetual, which for me is kind of a quintessential watch. Like it's literally a free hander. It just looks like if you were asking a 5 year old draw a watch, I think they would try to draw an Oyster perpetual. So it has that kind of iconic aspect to it that I was really, really interested in. And then I started to discover a lot of smaller brands that were doing things that were more geared towards me because as I've mentioned, I can't wear a Speedmaster. I mean, not that I can't, but I do because whatever is too big for you is something you decide for yourself. But in my case, like I feel like it's too big on my wrist. Like I feel like I can't really wear it in a way I really would like to. So a lot of the market was kind of close to me because was the generic watch was just too big for me. But that also opens really cool smaller niches. And what that means is that a lot of vintage watches actually look really good on me because I look good with a 32 millimeter on. And so getting to, to dig into those smaller spaces where it's not necessarily where everybody goes because yeah, I'm a lady with a tiny wrist and a lot of the industry for a long time ignored me. You know, the whole thing of make it quartz, put diamonds in the front and that would be a ladies watch is something that drives me nuts. Yeah, because no, I want, I want the mechanical stuff in the bag, I want the fun things that the others get. And so very often also when they shrink watches, a lot of brands will mess up the proportion, proportions. And it's just like every time you look at your wrist, it's a reminder that you don't have the real one, which really, really bothered me. But that means that, for example, like I have a 1945 Zenith Pilot that is 32 millimeters and that I bought from someone who is restoring watches and stuff and that for €600 I have a piece of history that looks really cool and that not everybody is chasing because, yeah, I'm not the majority of the market, but that opens things to me that, you know, if I can't wear the big fancy watches that are the norm, there are tons of other things that just work really well for me. And so that part of a rabbit hole got me into, you know, scaring ebays and other weird places for weird, vintage, funky pieces.

[A]

What has your most elaborate crazy out there watch that you've managed to get your hands on? What would that one be?

[B]

Crazy out there? I think I would have to give this one to my lip. So I'm French, so there are some brands that have a little bit more resonance with me because, because of that. And as I mentioned, my dad being the original white guy, I was much more familiar with French brands growing up, like Pekini, Yema, Lip, that were not necessarily like the forefront of a watch industry everywhere in the world. And so Lip, as a series of watches that were designed by Roger Talon, who is considered like the father of industrial design. So for French people, he created the design of the TGV, our fast trains in the 70s. He also did the design of the Minitel, which was like the ancestor of the Internet. And so I really. He did those funky LIP watches.

[A]

Are those the ones with the colored bubbles?

[B]

Yes, the color globes on the side. So the most famous one are the chronographs, but what I have is a little square one and I scoured ebay for a while to try to find the colorway I really wanted, because I wanted one that would be blue and teal, which are the colors of one of, of the TGDS. The Atlantic 1 is in those colors. So it's kind of reminding of other things that it's created. So I think mine and I Think I just don't have any proof of that. Is probably from the late 70s, but I don't have anything to. To document that. But for example, like, that's a very funky watch. It's tiny and it cost me 200 bucks maybe. And that would qualify as probably one of my most out there. Another one that is also a little bit crazy is that I have a credit quartz from also the 80s. So Credor did those watches that had like gold inlays on the side? Yes, it's a. It's a tiny square watch that looks very 80s when you look at it. And I put that on a mesh bracelet and it's very thin, which works well again for my tiny wrist. And you know, like again, a watch but I probably paid less than $300 US that people actually notice. But the funny thing is that of course nobody notices our watches except us. Like most common people don't look that. But the watch that I get people to notice and always ask me what it is is very funnily a retro Casio that's all gold. So it blinks a little and people kind of catch it and just like, what is this? And I'm just like, it's. It's tiny Casio.

[A]

Do you find though that know that your friends know you have this affliction known as watch collecting that they will significantly pull you to the side and ask what you're wearing when you turn up to things.

[B]

But they also need. They also need to be ready for me to go into a 10 minute nerdy tangent because you may have noticed, but I talk a lot. So.

[A]

Hey, listen, you're making my job super easy on this episode. You're probably, let me think now. So the Grandmaster is the chap whose name escapes me that runs the watch division at Bulgari. He came onto the show and I asked him three questions and then I stopped recording. What's the history of Bulgari, what's the history of aluminium and what's the history of Octo show done. You're coming in close second with your diatribes. But they're good, they're enjoyable. And the good thing is you're talking about lots. I think you mentioned Yema. That's a brand that we are speaking to behind the scenes about bringing onto the podcast to tell the history of the brand because they're releasing some amazing stuff. I believe we should have an episode out where we're talking about a camouflage watch that they have just released in the last few weeks that is phenomenal. And they've got in house movements the price point. They've kept at a low point. They've not inflated it or elevated up like the Japanese and the Swiss do. So yeah, there's always some good stuff happening. And France is just across the water from where we are. Scotland and France, sometimes we get on, sometimes we don't get on. I think we're doing all right just now right now.

[B]

You know, it's six nation tournament season, therefore we are friends. Because everything but the English, you know, that's, that's usually the way this works.

[A]

Oh that's, that's a very Scottish thing that you've managed to draw. And you mentioned Minitel. I used to run a bulletin board system on my computer back in the 90s. I know all about terminal systems. Tell me a little bit about your job.

[B]

I actually teach in a business school here in Canada and I study as a researcher, consumer psychology. And so a lot of my work is focusing on the things that we are not rational about but where we are actually irrational in kind of systematic way. Right. Trying to identify patterns of how our non rational ways show up. And so one big lesson if I was getting to the punchline of this whole years of studying is that we're not stupid, but we're pretty lazy. Which means that if there is a shortcut, we're going to take it. And those shortcuts sometimes lay us astray. And that's kind of.

[A]

Can you give an example of that?

[B]

Well, we were talking about brands that are really well known outside of, you know, the, the niche market that they sometimes target. And so one of the things that we do when we buy something we don't really know anything about is that we're going to say what other people are actually buying. So something being popular is being judged as the fact that it's going to be good quality and good value.

[A]

Is that a primal instinct of if the crowd are doing something, social proof says this is right?

[B]

Yeah, it's a hurting mentality. Right. It's a herd mentality that we have that if everybody is doing it, it cannot be that bad. And that applies in a lot of different things. But when you think about marketing, the fact that you're seeing a brand out there and everybody is buying it kind of gives you a shortcut for what to buy when you are confronted with a situation of buying something in that product category.

[A]

Is that why everybody went to Epstein Island?

[B]

Probably very. Some kind of normative behavior that may be at play. But I'm not going to talk about this because I think we're getting into abnormal psychology there. I'm just thinking about normal people doing small actions and anything that is psychiatrically problematic is absolutely not something that I would actually look into. And I think sometimes we get into that side of the issue if we're talking about watches and back to things in general. So, so yeah, we, we, we purchase a lot of things by using shortcuts. And so that's also why brands, you know, spend a lot of time trying to cultivate hype. That's what we do, right? We, we actually want a lot of people to buy it because a lot of people why buying it actually means more people will buy it, right? It's a self, it's a virtuous cycle in, in some ways and it plays into many. If there are two videos that come across our screen, we are going to vouch for one that has 3 million views rather than the one that has 100,000. We are going to buy the thing that everybody is buying. We are going to look at the Google review, the one that has the most five star reviews. And so it's not always a bad shortcut, but it kind of becomes one when we get to certain things. So that's an example of the type of shortcuts we use. If everybody is using it, if everybody has it, it's, it must be good. At the opposite end, we love to have what we can't have. And so if something is limited in availability for one reason or another, it makes it more valuable. So if something is rare, it actually becomes something we want to have just because we don't know if we can have to. And the example I use in class is actually the craziness that went when the Moonswatch was released because I think it's a really, really good example because it was not actually a limited edition. If you were pat, you were going to get one. But people, because of that fear of missing out, we can call it many different things, just went after it because if it was difficult to get, it was valuable. And we saw the crazy ebay listings, right? The week after the Moon Swatch was released. And you know, that was never $1,000 watch. It should never be $1,000 watch. I said it from the beginning, I'm a Swatch girl. I was super into the idea of this thing and I just really, really wanted one. But you just needed to wait. But most people did it, right? They just wanted this thing now because it was limited, it was valuable. And the only reason why it was this valuable is because not everybody can get one.

[A]

Can you explain how NFTs became popular?

[B]

Oh, I would love to, but I don't understand that. It's actually pretty funny at this point because we mentioned I'm teaching, so I. My students are everywhere between 19 and, you know, mid-20s. For my master's student, let's say I had had some students that were super into NFTs, and I was comparing in class NFTs to art in some aspect, which is like the market determined the value, right? It was something that had no correlation with what it was actually worth. And it's very funny because for them, I was just, you know, this woman that was kind of out of touch with what was happening in the world. And so I would love to meet them again now. That would be very, very satisfying. But I don't get to do that. So.

[A]

Yeah, what a shame. No, I saw. I mentioned it on the show recently, and it's pertinent to conversation just now because I think it was Jake Paul had spent half a million dollars on something that's now worth $167, not thousand dollars. So, no, we were advocates back in the day of this is the Emperor's New Clothes. This will not last. This is bullshit. And there was so many people that jumped on. I remember interviewing Kevin O' Leary from Shark Tank, Mr. Wonderful, various other places, and it was in Dubai. And he said, oh, NFTs are the future. If you can't afford to buy the new Ming watch, you buy the NFT version of it. And I sat there thinking, this is the biggest lot of shit I've ever heard.

[B]

And that's the thing, is that we've been through some of that, right? When people. And some of the same things happening with VR, right, VR was supposed to be the revolution for everything. But for people who've been long enough around, like you and I, we've seen Second Life falling on its face, right? It was supposed to be the new thing that people, people would live in that virtual world. And just like, just because you make it 3D with goggles is not going to change the fact that people are not going to do this.

[A]

$70 billion is how much Mark Zuckerberg shat down the toilet. And they finally killed it. They killed the metaverse a couple of weeks ago because 900 active users per month ain't going to keep it running.

[B]

So I think that that's when my job comes into play, which is the consumer psychology aspect of it, which is what people want to do and don't want to do. And adoption is a very weird need some kind of maverick group to take on something. Like you need a core group of early adopters for something to actually spread because most innovations spread through a very small group at the beginning. And then you get like innovators and people who are a little bit curious about it that will get into it, but only when it's been a little bit proven right, when it's been around the block. And then you're going to get the majority of people, people that potentially adopt it. And then you will have the people who don't have any choice, they have to adopt it because now it's the norm. And therefore, you know, they are the legged. They are the people who don't really want to adopt this new thing.

[A]

Let me bring that back to watches quickly before we get totally down rabbit holes already. That to me sounds like pebble watch. Back 12, 13 years ago, Pebble Watch was the first smartwatch, really that ended up in Kickstarter. I bought one, I was an early adopter. It cost a lot of money. It hardly worked. When it did work, it was terrible. Then they get bought by Fitbit, I think it was. Then the Apple watch came out and then suddenly everyone had fitness trackers, oura rings, all kinds of stuff. But they were the trendsetters at the beginning, the pioneers.

[B]

Yeah. And so you will see a lot of stories in different industry where something like this happens, where like a smaller brand, because they can innovate, because they are more agile, because they don't have anything to lose, will launch those really like innovative technologies. And when there is kind of a proof of concept that there is a market for it, that things will happen. Now the big boys are going to look into and sometimes buy out those companies or copy them sometimes. Sometimes patterns cannot be always a really good barrier to certain things. And so you will get to that thing. And it's really interesting to think about it because we are in a hobby of liking a technology that's completely outdated, that has no specific value in terms of what it's bringing. There are tons of other waste to read time and we are still attached to this thing that is just doing a job that a lot of other tools can do. And we're willing to spend a lot of money on something completely outdated because we feel a connection to it. And so that's really interesting from any kind of perspective when you think about collectors, a lot of times that's what's going on. Right. It's, it's obviously not the object. It's the what attracts us to the object and the stories we build around them that really. And, and I think that there is something to be said about liking this tangible thing in a world where a lot of things will completely dematerialize, right? We read books on screens, we listen to music for streaming services. All those things are happening. And having a place where something is going to remain an outdated, analog, tangible object really, really matters. And I think part of what is fun in it is that it's also being able to understand. Because at this point, most people go through their day using 80% of technologies they don't understand, they couldn't replicate. They don't understand what's going on. When you're thinking about a mechanical watch. Not that I could build a watch from scratch, but that's not what's going on here. But when I look at the mechanism, I can understand what's going on. I can actually see what is happening with it. I can get an understanding, even if it's big picture of what's happening when my day changes every day. It's not even the case with a quartz watch. Like, yes, intellectually I understand this idea of a crystal that's vibrating, but it becomes very abstract very fast. A mechanical watch is a bunch of gears. And there is something that is easy to understand and for us to grasp. And I think it has a place in the world where we actually don't have a lot of objects like this in the ways we use the things we use every day.

[A]

You're right. I'm thinking I've made the talk on the show before that there are certain things that you are completely correct about. Nostalgia plays a part, but sometimes it's not even nostalgia because kids these days are. Maybe in their teenage years, they didn't have a grandmaphone, a record player. So they have got. And it's almost a counterculture to the norm. You'll do something and then there'll be this polar magnetic shift in the consciousness of the world and it will flip around. It used to be back in the 80s, 70s and 80s, with hi Fi equipment, everything was silver, then it was black, then it was silver, then it was black. And it just seems to be the continuation of this.

[B]

And it's kind of interesting. Right? Going back to my classroom, I have a lot of early 20s, let's put it like this, in general. And most of my students don't wear a watch. Let's be absolutely clear. They just don't. But there are no smartwatches in my classrooms like that's. Something their parents use, but they don't. So they will wear a garment when they go running, but they don't wear a thing all day long. And there are more traditional watches in my classrooms than there are smartwatches.

[A]

Why Islam?

[B]

I don't know. But when I give exams, you know, I would. I take people's cell phones. And I was used to making them put their smartwatch in a bag. And I don't have to do that anymore. Out of 120 students I had last semester, one person was wearing a smartwatch. One in the classroom. I had at least a dozen of other watches. And there is a bit of everything there. You know, there are some Seikos and some little Casio or retro Casios and things. But, you know, I have a student who has a Norris pointer date, and that is the thing that wouldn't have happened a few years back. So there is definitely some room for it. And, you know, I used to teach in the. What was really the heydays of influencer marketing. I think we are, we are falling a little bit on that one. There is a lot more skepticism, a lot more milking of the cow that just happened to make it less efficient. But so I was in the heart of a whole Daniel Wellington thing. Like, I'm too old to have made that specific mistake. But I, you know, my students were in, in, in this thing, and there were some students who were like, oh, they made it cool to wear a watch. And I'm just like, oh. And I just had to sit there, right? And so one of my students, because they, they were analyzing campaigns and they were also looking at, like, meaningful purchases for them. And one of my students, clearly in reaction to the Daniel Willington like, like trend that a lot of the other students were using in the class, presented how we bought his Seiko. And I think if I remember things correctly, it was a Seiko presage that he had bought. He wanted a bit of more dress watch. So he explained, like, you know, how he did research, how he bought it, how he did this whole thing. And a student in the class was just like, why do you pay so much more money for this thing? Because it's mechanical when you cannot even see through movement. And it was true. It was closed case back, like there was nothing. And the student replied with, well, I don't see the movement, but I see its consequences because my watch doesn't take its sweeps. And you know, we're not supposed to have favorite students. But at some point when someone is standing in Front of a room like this, being like, yeah, keep your Daniel Wellington, I will keep my Seiko. There was a little moment of like, oh, you cute at that level.

[A]

Well, calling into your day job what you do, the way that you try and explain the mind and it works. I know how my mind works most of the time, but I still get caught with the 9.99 versus 10. I still get caught with the, oh, well, we've got three other people interested in this, sir. Or this is the last one we've got. It might not be here. Why do we keep falling for that every single time when we know it's booed?

[B]

Well, that's the thing is that I tell my students very clearly because, you know, they're in their early 20s, they think they are smarter than everybody and not, not a judgment of value. I was the same way at. You should be this way at 20.

[A]

Well, listen, see, since we're in our 40s, we're twice as clever as those guys.

[B]

But that's one of the things, like first I have to show them that it works on them because for them for a really long time, it's like other people are dumb and this works on them. And so I really have to do this. You know, I use sneaker examples of like how some of the most expensive sneakers are limited edition. And it's just because Adidas slash, Nike slash, whoever has just decided they will release only this number. It's not because there is anything scarce about it. It's just because the people who are producing it just decided we are only going to release this many and, and that it works on them. And I tell them, like, I study this every day, it works on me. Just so we're clear, like it's, we are not immune. And so there are a few things that seem to be very deeply ingrained, like almost innate. And there are very few of those things in human nature. We are pretty useless when we're born. We can't do anything. Everything we do is learned. But there seem to be a few things that are so deeply ingrate. What we find them in all cultures at all ages. And one of them is reciprocity, right? If someone does something nice for you, you feel like you owe them. Whether you repay them is a different question. But you feel like you owe them. And we have enough evidence to know that this is true at almost any age. It is true in almost any culture. And there is this whole idea that when someone does something nice for you, you want to do something nice for them. And you feel like you owe them. So it's that one, for example, is super deeply ingrained. So when a brand is going to offer you a discount, which is seen as like them being nice to you, or when they are going to be willing to make a compromise on something, you're more willing to meet them halfway. And so we know that is something that's very deeply ingrained in the way we think in general.

[A]

Does this only happen with humans or do primates do this and other species do this?

[B]

Very good question. I am not very well versed in the animal kingdom. And what actually translates to just humans? Yeah, I kind of only deal with humans. And so we know that that fear of missing out, that idea of like, if I can't have it, it's more valuable, seems to translate really across a wide variety of contexts. And it's even to the point of things like limited exhibits in museums. People who would have never been interested in a certain painter, a certain sculpture or certain part of history will go just because there is a limited time exhibit near them. And it's something they would have never done otherwise. Just because they may not be able to do it in the future makes it more desirable right now. And it does seem to apply everywhere now. I do believe that some brands are playing a little bit too much the scarcity game. We've seen that there are brands that are dealing with ultimate scarcity, which is like, they have a drop and if you have not checked out within five seconds, you will never get your goods. We've seen that with a lot of like, influencers and tiktokers and things, which is like, okay, they have a drop and if you're not in front of it and you don't check out within like the first minute, everything is sold out. At this point, I think you're going to stop, start building some resentment that will exceed the desirability and goodwill that you find from it. And this is just my opinion. I don't have any data to support that one. But I think we've seen some brands going too far in the scarcity game and it's a drop and a thing. So I think that a lot of brands actually in the watch industry have found some interesting things around that, which is like still using the scarcity aspect, but also giving everybody a chance. So all those, like limited window for ordering, for example, like, it's not limited to a number, it's limited to a time frame. So you still have that activation of the if I don't do it now, I won't get it, but you know that you will get one if you make the decision. So I think that's kind of an interesting middle ground that a lot of watch brands seem to have to have used.

[A]

I like that one because if you're asleep, I tried to get hold of the Casio Back to the Future watch, which was a re edition of Marty's calculator watch. And Doc had one as well in the movie. And I didn't know when it was coming out, even though we've got contacts at Casio and G Shock. I didn't know when. I knew roughly, but I didn't know when. And I got an email at 1 in the morning. I was up editing and my email pinged in and it doesn't automatically come in every single minute. So I was five minutes late. And that five minute window meant when I went to the website, they were gone. Compare that to if you wanted to prick a prick, if you wanted to pick up one of the studio underdog watches where they put a window. And so you're paying the same amount of money, you're guaranteed one, but the grab to go first. The whole point of being first in the queue is you will receive your watch first, whereas it might take three months if you're the last people in. So again, there's the scarcity, there's a fear of missing out, plus there's the being fast or your last. And all those things work fantastically well. And I love Rich because what he does with people that then throw them straight on ebay is fantastic.

[B]

Talk about someone who does marketing as well as he does watches. But yeah, I have a tiny studio in the Dog story, actually, because I always liked the design, but I had not seen them in person. So I was always like, okay, this is going to look silly on me and all that kind of stuff. So when I finally got my hands onto onto one, I'm just like, okay, I could do this, but I kind of really waited for my studio Underdog, like, just like, which is the one that's really going to resonate with me. And it released the smoked salmon, right, which was like the salmon dye but without any of the markings. And I'm just like, okay, this one is one for me. And of course, the window was one hour only and I was doing something official at the time and it was just like, oh, how do I make this happen? So I started lamenting a little bit about it and someone that, you know, we have in common, the good Andrew Molin was like, Ellen, if you really want that to watch. We can probably make it happen. Like, you know, it's like it's one hour, but if you tell me we can, we can probably, you know, there is, there is a way to make that happen. And actually I was, I was doing something that was live and online and stuff, and we ended five minutes before the end of the hour and I just jumped on my computer and I bought myself a smoked salmon. I was the last one to order it because it was in the last five minutes of it happening. But yeah, so, so, yeah, looking like a crazy person at work, like jumping away from, from an official phone call to just go buy myself a smoked salmon. No regret there. I absolutely love that watch.

[A]

Well, I think the way that things move generationally, things that appear, really. I saw a brilliant meme the other day and it says, in the future, I will probably have the conversation with my son about the fact I really want him to marry a human and not an AI robot. And I'll be seen as a roboticism person instead of a racist person. So the things that appear today to us as, okay, we're going for a drop that's going to end in five minutes. No one will understand. We understand. Our parents might not understand, Grandparents definitely don't understand. But our kids and our grandkids will do crazy shit that we won't understand.

[B]

Absolutely.

[A]

But.

[B]

But they will go back to those fundamental principles we were talking about. Right. Even if the way it's done changes, the fundamental rules that move us are the same. So the world, the norm, society change, human nature doesn't. And you can read older books, you can read things from the 18th century and people will say, oh, our kids don't have a right. Work ethics. They don't understand. Things like, this is not new. This happens every generation. We don't. You know, if you put grandparents and grandkids together, they don't understand each other on silly things. And it has always been the case. It's nothing new. But the fundamentals of human nature do not change.

[A]

This is true. Well, if you were to cast your mind back through the history books and not talk about the Omega Stroke Speedmaster Moonswatch fiasco debacle that happened a few years ago. Are there other significant points within marketing history over the past 50, 100, 200 years where this kind of thing has happened before?

[B]

It's kind of interesting, right, because we know that we are entering a crisis for watches right now, quote, unquote crisis. Right. We just know that things expanded a lot during the pandemic and there seemed to be like you could launch almost anything and it would sell and there was high PCs and all that stuff. And so we're seeing a contracting, right? And we're probably going to see some form of concentration happening, which means that some smaller brands will probably disappear in the next five years. We're probably going to see that fragmentation of like, of a million micro brands that are out there just contracting into being something a little bit smaller as part of a crisis. But those are cyclical, right? They keep coming back and they keep being a thing. And so when we are looking at like, like significant marketing milestones in the watch industry, you know, it was not called influencer marketing, but putting your watch on the wrist of someone famous that people admire is nothing new, right? It was not an influencer. It was not necessarily. But the concept of a brand ambassador, even if we were not calling it that way, has been there for quite a long time. And you know, we can point the finger at Rolex for some of this. You know, when they started putting watches on people that were doing cool stuff and, and that was, that was part of it. And of course a lot of it is the storytelling that goes with it. It doesn't even really matter who the person is, it's how much you are going to talk about it. There is a rule in marketing that if you sponsor an event, you're going to spend this much on sponsoring the event and probably twice as much talking about the fact that you're sponsoring the event. Right. And a lot of that is true as well with like putting your watch on the wrist of someone cool. And it's kind of interesting to see how this works because again, going back to my students, most of them don't care about watches. Some of them do. But when Taylor Swift got pulled, proposed to, and she was wearing a vintage Cartier, I literally saw my students started looking up Cartier watches on ebay, which was lovely when you had the gentleman from ebay actually backing this up with numbers. Because I was just like, for me it's anecdotal evidence. So knowing that it's actually translating in numbers for ebay was just really interesting because yeah, they started to figure out, okay, well like, that's not something I can afford right now. But what is it going to take for me to add a Cartier watch to the stack of, of bracelets I'm wearing every day? And it's something that they had not thought about the week before. Right? Those kind of impact and those kind of things still happen. If you find the right person in the right way.

[A]

Did they become shocked when they found the price it would cost to obtain the item?

[B]

I was not close enough to the action to really know how some of them reacted to this, but I think there was probably a little bit of everything because they see it as a piece of fancy jewelry and jewelry by Calci is not cheap in any way or shape. So I think it kind of, you know, met some of the things that they were potentially thinking about. But yeah, most people are shocked when they realize what a watch is worth in general. Right.

[A]

This is a fantastic episode and I'm doing my best to shut the hell up because the content here is phenomenal. There's a new word that people didn't really use in the past. Content. I have a question for you. You're talking about people that are famous being linked to our product and that causes the price to skyrocket. Something that always sat in my head and I can't figure it out. No one's really explained it yet. So here's one for you. Paul Newman was a fantastic man, made fantastic salad dressing, was a great actor, but he wasn't the biggest, he wasn't the best, he wasn't the most well known. In the latter years, he didn't do as many things film wise as perhaps other people out there. Why did the Paul Newman Daytona command such attention and money when it came to auction?

[B]

Well, it's, you know, hindsight is 20 20, so now that we know it's a fancy piece, we can find tons of reasons for why. But sometimes you catch lightning in a bottle and there is no explaining it. And that's also what is hard in marketing, right? Because something works really well and if you try to replicate it, it doesn't. Once the rulebook is out, it doesn't work anymore. And we see it with people grabbing attention, right? There is a thing that works, that garner so much attention, goes a little bit viral, is shared by a lot of people and then 10 brands are going to try to do the same thing and just fall, settle in space, right? Because the second you see it and the second it's worked, it's already outdated, which is kind of a fascinating thing. So explaining the whole Paul Newman thing is a little bit tricky because I can find tons of reasons for why he was especially aspirational why?

[A]

But why not Steve McQueen? But why not Jack Nicholson, but why not Al Pacino?

[B]

And, and that's the thing is that when people start talking about it creates a mythology around it and it becomes sometimes it gets to a critical mass that it doesn't really matter because it's just going to grab attention and it's become the point of reference. And I don't have a good way to explain it. I really don't. Because some of those things get, get really, like, again, like, if we want to dissect it, that sometimes happens. Right. When we try to look at business that are successful and we're like, why are they successful? Can we replicate this thing? And you can find tons of reasons why they are successful for why they are. Can you actually just do it by putting together everything they've done and doing it again and actually getting the same results? The answer is no most of the time. Right. And so it's kind of interesting to see that, yeah, you're right. The Paul Newman is. We can find a lot of reasons why he was cool, why that watch is pretty cool. Cool. And why all those things and the fact that, you know, those, those type of indices were of a very specific era, were not a thing that Rolex was doing as a norm most of the time and didn't become a thing that everybody could have. So there, there are several things that we could try to put together and shake to try to explain what's. What's going on. But you're right, like, there are tons of others that we're like, well, that didn't happen there. And there were. That potentially has many reasons. And I think it's the stories that we tell and the ones that actually cut through. And you were talking about content, while content creators are also shaping all of that. Like, the video we watch is on. We watch on YouTube, the podcast, we listen to all those things. You know, if we've heard of a story once, two, three times, it becomes something that actually, you know, more and more people know about. And the amount of exposure actually actually gets gets to it. And, you know, a lot of this is about what we remember. For example, we're talking a little bit about like ambassador brand ambassadors and influencer marketing and all those things. And a lot of people in our niche in our corner, because we never, we should never forget that even of the people who buy watches, we are the minority, the people who care about the movement, who know everything about it. We're going to decycle this. Like, even when we're looking at watch buyers, we are a small proportion of the market and they are like, oh, I'm not going to buy a watch because I saw Zendaya buying it. No, but that's not the goal. You, as a person was already super aware of what's happening in that niche. Of course, seeing a cool person wearing it is not really going to do anything. But what you have to think about is the fact that, well, when Ryan Gosling is wearing a pink Tag Heuer, a lot of people who have never heard of Tag Heuer are going to notice that watch. Does it mean that all of them are going to buy one? No, but you're still, like, feeding the pipeline of the people who are aware of it. And so other people were aware. Some of them are going to develop an interest, and all the people who are interested, some of them will go all the way to buying the watch. But just because you saw Ryan Gosling with a watch doesn't make you buy it, but it makes it memorable, and it may make you interested and might just poke your interest into doing it. So every time when we look at our small niche and the people like us, and we're like, oh, yeah, no, you know, Ambassador, brand ambassadors don't matter to me. Well, that's true to us, it probably doesn't matter. We would know what the latest release is even if it was not worn by a celebrity. But the majority of people are not in that category. And just having a celebrity wear something is going to make it more memorable. And it. It is the goal for the brands that are doing this. They are not going after us. We're not the target market for that specific type of marketing. Because, yeah, we're going to go out of our way to figure out what has been released, what we like, but that's not the majority of people. Right.

[A]

It's strange you say this now. We're coming to the end of the first of many episodes. I can tell there are many more tales to tell, but I seem to be, and probably yourself, now that everybody knows you're into watches. I'm the person that whenever a celebrity wears a cool watch, they're spotted at the Met Gala, they're at a film premiere, or they're in a movie starring in a movie. I'm the person that gets a message going, such and such an actress, such and such an actor, such and such a performer is wearing this watch. Is it cool? When did it come out? How much does it cost? What's the story behind it? I get that kind of thing. And it's story, story, story, story. That's what the podcast is all about. These things that we're wearing on our wrists, they're just hunks of metal. It's the stories they hold within humans

[B]

relate to humans and therefore we relate to stories. And that's the whole, whole point of, of this thing. And you know, I was talking about my old Seiko Kinetic when I was in high school. I wore it the day I went to take my historian geography exam out of high school because we had Japan as part of a program and I wanted really, really, really the, the thing to be about Japan. So I was just kind of tend to fade and was like, I'm going to wear my Seiko because Japan Japanese watch and it's going to happen. It was absolutely not about Japan and I didn't get to write about it. But I remember that every time I look at that watch, which is a very silly thing, but that sends me back to that stupid memory that I have with it. And yeah, I mean, the hunk of metal is not that important, but the story we tell ourselves really are. And that's how these things work. Like, I try to buy watches that you know, are going to mean something beyond the actual purchase. And so, you know, one of the brands that seem to be talking to me a lot is nomos, right? Because, well, they even have their own fountain pen that was designed by Kaweco. So I don't know, it just feels like, you know, okay, we're in simpatico on some levels. But I wanted until I went to Germany to buy my Nomos. So now my nomos is something that I bought in Germany that was part of a trip that was part of something special and also ends up being a watch that I didn't think I would buy because I thought that a 38 millimeter would be too big for me. I tried it on and I actually really liked how big the dial was and I thought it looked cool because the watch is still really thin. And so I have an almost tangente 38 millimeters that I wouldn't have bought if I had not been able to try it. But also that is attached to a specific trip and a specific moment that happened. And I think when. But we engineer this type of things in our lives and that's what makes our collections valuable. Right?

[A]

It's a very expensive photo album. That's what our watch collections are. And the way that you've explained that I have just connected some dots. I now know the reason that Swatch have got stores in every airport. Because I come through the airport and I buy a watch. I buy a watch in Dubai airport to remind me of my first trip to Dubai. I pick something up in Geneva to signify something I've done in Geneva, I buy a gift for the wife in London at the airport, a swatch. I bring it home. That is how it works. And unfortunately for us, it's an extremely expensive way of collecting postcards to give us memories on things. It totally is. But unfortunately, really, really unfortunately, we are at the end of this show because we have to keep them just under one hour. There you go. There's a psychological thing for us to end on. People love a podcast if it's 59 minutes or less. But see, if it goes over the one hour mark, they don't have time to download it.

[B]

Fear of commitment.

[A]

Terrible, terrible. Listen, this has been amazing. I had no idea what this would be like, what we would chat about, which rabbit holes we would end up going down, but we have been down many. Thankfully, we've managed to use our GPS to get back out the other side. And you will definitely, if you wish, come back and do more episodes because I think there are many more tales to tell.

[B]

Well, obviously it's like asking people if they want to be part of a hall of fame, you know.

[A]

There we go. Well, you have a few more to get under your belt before you can meet the latest at the high score table, which is obviously the likes of Barbara Palumbo, Sarah Ferguson, Dave. I think Dave is probably the guy at the top.

[B]

Well, that would make sense, right?

[A]

Yeah, you've got a bit to go before you upstart him, but no, this has been phenomenal. Have you got an online blog, anything you'd like to push people towards to find out more?

[B]

I only write academic papers which are back, I design extremely boring and I wouldn't wish on anyone to have to read them. So there is not really a place for you to find me online to blabber about this type of stuff.

[A]

Should we tell everybody that you're just an AI voice?

[B]

Of course. But that accent is very, very weird to engineer.

[A]

They're working out the kinks. It's fine. Elon will be on that. Well, listen, if people want to check out what we're up to, we're out twice a week, Mondays and Thursdays. Catch us online ottottishwatches, drop us down emails. That's how we were communicating with the guest, the star player today. And that email address is info scottishwatches.co.uk so thanks for joining us, thanks for listening and we'll catch you again soon.

[B]

Bye, Sam.