I don’t know if “buy the seller” originated from the watch community but it’s certainly there that I first heard it. It’s one of those useful advices that don’t only apply to watch buying. But how do you buy the seller? No one tells you that.
The more astute watch buyer would merely investigate the buyer’s history, check out their online rating, look at comments and reviews, see if there are any complaints against the seller. After all, online reputation is built on the word of total strangers who may or may not be collectively telling you what you want to hear in the first place.
The less astute, which is me, befriend a seller to get to know them at a personal level. This approach takes effort and time. First get something small and inexpensive, chat with the seller all the time—talk about everything, even things unrelated to watches—then work your way up to more expensive pieces. I don’t recommend doing what I did but there are advantages to bonding with a vintage watch dealer that can’t be overstated.
For one thing, I get first look and first refusal on the more interesting pieces that my vintage girl (my term of endearment for my vintage watch dealer) acquires. After the fifth or sixth purchase and after the countless chat lines on Facebook Messenger between purchases, she pretty much knows what I’d like to see. She has no expectations that I would be interested to purchase all the watches she gets. However, she shows me most of them anyway, sometimes to flex (if the pieces end up in her personal collection) and sometimes because of their rarity and story and sometimes just because she loves them. She did learn not to show me her Seikos though. She’s a Seiko fan and loves the Alpinist. However, she knows I wouldn’t be as enthused as her so why would she let me ruin her fun by showing them to me? There are exceptions to this no Seiko rule, of course.
Another advantage is that for the watches that I do want, I pay considerably less than their advertised prices. Don’t get me wrong. She’s still making money off me and I expect her to. She has to make a living after all. But not as much as she would’ve if someone else bought it. And in exchange, I try not to take advantage of my friends and family discount. I’m very selfish about it, in fact. Whenever someone—a colleague or friend or family—wants to get something that they see on her instagram or website, I’m more than happy to connect them with her but I try not to get in between them. Sometimes they want to go through me. Depending on my relationship with the requester, I would sometimes agree to broker the purchase, albeit begrudgingly. But I make sure my vintage girl knows if it’s not for me so that she could price the watch accordingly. She would not give them the “Sherwin price.”
Third advantage: I get a credit line. This is a tricky topic because it might be misconstrued as advocacy for financing. So let me be clear about something: It’s not advisable to buy watches on installment. Either you have the money or you don’t. If you don’t, you shouldn’t buy something with future earnings. That said, my vintage girl and I have built a trust between us that I could get a watch without paying for it right there and then. When I see a watch I like and can afford (can’t stress that enough), I would just commit to getting it and she would send me the watch right away without seeing the color of my money first. The payment would be made at my convenience, whether that’s the next bank day or a month later if I’m busy with life. There’s no deadline. Again, I don’t buy or commit to a watch unless I already have the money to spend on it. But that doesn’t mean I have to transfer the funds the very second I pull the trigger. And she doesn’t have to wait until I send the money before she starts packing and sending off the watch.
If I were someone else, she would never send out a watch that’s unpaid. She has a layaway program, of course, for those interested in paying installments. Again, I don’t recommend this. But she won’t send out the watch until the whole amount had been paid. But not so with me.
A lot of our deals tend to go like this:
“I have x, do you want it?”
“How much is it?”
“It’s y.”
“Okay, I’ll take it.”
“I’ll send it out tomorrow.”
“I’ll pay you next week. Maybe.”
“No prob.”
We’re both probably being foolish in this regard. She could potentially lose a valuable asset if I didn’t pay, while I risk overcommitting to watches since money does not need to literally come out of my savings account at the exact point of transaction. But like I said, trust had been established. I made sure that I’m paid up ahead of agreed upon dates, which we had at the early stage of our relationship. These days we don’t have agreed upon dates anymore. She’ll get her money when she gets it, which for my part I make sure won’t take forever.
There are other advantages:
When I need a watch serviced (and not necessarily watches I got from her) she takes care of sending it to her expert watchmaker. I have 4 watches being serviced through her as we speak.
I don’t have to work as hard on finding out how authentic or original a vintage watch is before I buy it. When she got a 1950s Rolex Oyster Perpetual, which she then first offered to me, I said yes. She asked if she should send it right away. Since I was still enjoying my newly acquired 1970s Cartier Tank (also from her), I told her I would just get it from her when we next meet. Besides, buying a Rolex for me felt more like going to the dentist. It just had to be done to get it over with. Two weeks later, she messaged me that she won’t be selling me the Oyster Perpetual after all because she discovered that it’s been redialed. I told her I didn’t mind actually. But she insisted, saying that since I’ve got such an animosity towards Rolex she didn’t want my first Rolex to have be anything less than perfect. So a few months later, I ended up getting an Oysterdate from her. It was cheaper than the Oyster Perpetual and in better, greater condition. I’m satisfied.
In other words, she took care of me.
We have settled on a co-dependency that some might consider unhealthy. In between purchases, we bother each other with strap ideas for some of our more interesting pieces. I tease her about her Seiko love and she teases me back about my snobbery. It’s all in good fun, teenage besties feigning meanness to one another in lieu of cuddly warmth.
I don’t know where it started or how it happened but suddenly we found ourselves being more friends than commerce participants. We’re no longer just seller-customer. For Christmas, she gave me a 1950s Doxa Military watch.
And I gave her my 1920s Elgin Legionnaire.
We’ve also gotten to the point were when I was feeling particularly down and depressed at the start of 2024, she and her girlfriend took me out for a good time. That’s not nothing. I’ve been to her house and her girlfriend had made me lunch. I’m not polite around her, she’s not polite around me. She enjoys me getting under her girlfriend’s skin. I often complain about the straps that come with her vintage pieces. At the start of our business relationship, she would be apologetic and offer to get it replaced with something else. These days when I complain about the straps, I get a “fuck you.” She knows about my personal life and I know about hers.
She started making her own straps and forced me–as in obligated and guilt-tripped me–into buying one of her initial efforts. It was 4 USD but the worst 4 USD I’ve ever spent on watch-related stuff. She never heard the end of it from me. She believes she’ll get better and maybe make straps as good as Delugs someday. I encourage her by calling her straps crap. Hey, I’m supporting her by giving her something to aim for, which is to prove me wrong. I’m nice that way. I’m such a saint. Sigh. How lucky is she to have me as a friend?
Now, not all watch dealers are like her and not everyone gets to have what I have with her. But if you do find yourself fortunate enough to meet a watch dealer worth being friends with, the time and effort to grow that relationship will yield tremendous benefits. People ask me how I built my vintage watch collection so quickly, making it look so easy. Well, it is easy when I have my vintage girl helping me out.
I do sometimes wish that we have a falling out, and soon. My wallet would thank me if we did.
The Escapement Room 