Johnny Garrat | Crowdfunding a Luxury Watch Brand

Johnny, why is the watch market crashed?

Few reasons. I think the value that people now see in watches is it's ever moving since even just two years ago people were investing in luxury watches for a second hand value which I think is also a problem. You know the whole reason we're in business is to be able to produce watches that you can actually wear on a daily basis and appreciate. Now there's so much supply in the marketplace that you are sort of struggling where to be able to make these purchases apart from brands obviously like in your likes of Rolex. So the difficulty is now is with an oversupply and so many different options it's very difficult to be able to maintain those values. And that's where the luxury brands are really struggling now. They're almost producing too many pieces.

Do you think it's a knock on post lockdown effect? Because I remember when lockdown happened and I thought everything's going to go to shit and I broke one of my rules which is never sell. So I had an RM11 and I sold that in the early 80s and made a tiny bit on it which you never did. RMs used to drop like crazy and then that RM Richard meal RM11 went up to nearly 200 grand. And I just saw it go like that.

Yeah.

And I thought this is mad. I sold a Nautilus Chronograph. I sold it, I bought it for 25, I sold it for 36. I thought I'm well in here. And then it went up to 150 grand. And I've never seen anything like this. I've been buying watches for 15 years. I love watches. And you know, I believe it was because there was just a cut of supply because. Because obviously everything was shut and they couldn't make for a while and then that supply or lack of supply has a knock on effect. And I just thought these watches are crazy, prices are crazy, it's ridiculous. So now it's fallen. Is it back to normal and is it a reaction from post lockdown blues?

Yeah, we saw that during COVID sort of Contrary to what everybody was seeing, I think everyone thought that people didn't have money, they were feeling really down about themselves. But actually everybody was at home, they weren't going on holiday, they weren't committing into work, they weren't buying their lunch and they wanted to spend money. What we saw was we actually saw some of the best sales periods we've ever seen during COVID for our own watch sales and we just couldn't understand. But to be Fair. Like many brands, we went all in on marketing on the Internet as well and I think there was, there was a definite oversupply during, during COVID as a result of people having a lot.

More disposable income over supply of money under supply of watches.

Exactly, yeah. And people being locked away and wanting to actually feel better about themselves. So when you start coming back to normality.

Boredom.

Exactly.

What you do when you're bored, you spend money, of course. Oh, and you made a bit in bitcoin. Didn't really. Didn't really have to work for that. I'll spend it.

Exactly, exactly. It's a similar thing that we see from industry to industry. We were just talking about cars earlier on. It was a similar thing in the car market as well, wasn't it? Yeah.

Do you think these brands though jumped on this and started taking the piss out of us? Because, I mean, I've been buying Pateks forever and then you're like, oh, who cares about that? You have to buy 2, 3, 4 of these window standard models that you don't want that will go down in value so you can get an Autolis. Is that taking the piss out of the customers?

Well, yeah, of course, yeah. It's. It's like they're basically saying that you need to purchase and have a certain amount of depreciation on some of the assets that we produce before you can actually jump into our headline piece. Yeah. Which there's only certain brands in the world that can do that kind of thing.

Ferrari and Porsche were doing it in lockdown.

Exactly.

Ap. To a certain degree we're doing it. I can't decide if that's really smart marketing. Hey, look, we're a high end brand, you know, you have to earn the right to buy from us. Part of me thinks that's. Part of me thinks that's just so arrogant and it's taking the piss out of the customers.

Sure.

What do you think?

I couldn't agree more. And I think this is the reason why we're seeing such a rise of independent brands, especially in the watch world. We've seen in the last three years the amount of customers who now know more or want to educate themselves on other independent sort of lesser well known brands. And there's a lot of independents out there where you can spend north of £25,000 and it's a brand that you've never heard of, but their watch manufacturing capabilities and expertise are incredible. I think it's also. There has to be a bit of a change in mentality as well, where once you've got the watches that show how well you're doing in life, you should then look to consider pieces which actually are felt from the heart is something that you actually want to buy and have an interest in, rather than just buying it. As I'm doing this to show the type of lifestyle that I have because I can afford this type of watch. And this is where we're seeing a rise now in the independent space because more people now are wanting to wear things that actually have purpose rather than appreciation, value in the future.

Yeah, I feel a bit conflicted about that.

Yeah.

Because you know, there's a watch design that you might love like the Patek Philippe Nautilus or the, the Royal Oak with Audemars Piguet. And just a few years ago, you know, These watches are 30s, thousands. You can even get them in the 20s. Now you can't get them under 100. And then they make these editions, limited editions. I used to fall for that.

Yeah.

I, I, I've got loads of limited edition aps which, you know, they're limited edition, so they're the ones that go up in value and they haven't gone up in value because they make a new limited edition, a new one and a new one and a new one and a new one that actually it's not a limited edition.

Exactly.

And actually what you find out is it's not about the limited edition, it's about the numbers they make every year. So you feel bit like Ms. Sold to, but now they make these Pateks and these, the Nautilus is and they make the Royal oaks and they're 150, 200, 300 grand. You know, they make the Travis Scott one or the John Mayer one and all of a sudden a watch design that you love, which you used to be able to get for 25 grand, now you can't get in under 150 grand. And oh, by the way, it's a three year wait list.

Yeah.

Oh, and if you want a second hand one, you have to pay 50% more.

Yeah.

Again, I can't decide if this is brilliant marketing from these watch brands or they're mugging off the clients. I feel mugged off.

Yeah. I mean, I can understand why the consumer feels like that. At the end of the day, aren't.

They supposed to make us feel special? It's like we've got to make them feel special to get a watch from them.

Yeah, yeah.

Aren't we the client?

Yeah. It's wild. It's absolutely Wild. I think it's.

Or am I just a grumpy British bastard?

Possibly a bit of both, Rob. I think maybe. But I think it's a bit of marketing brilliance. Let's be honest. This has happened ever since marketing was a thing. You know, if you go right back to cigarette adverts, if you go right back to vintage luxury car adverts, they're always trying to sell the essence of how you're going to feel when you actually have this watch. When they tie that in with a celebrity that you love and admire, that's when you start to see the secondhand values going up and that's when it gets. That's when it becomes a really tricky business to be in. Then, you know, same watch. It is.

So I used to look at all the AP limited editions ago.

Yeah.

That's nice.

That's different.

Different. That's nice. It's not. It's the same watch.

Yeah.

And like the John. The John Mayer Royal Oak.

Yeah.

You know, the price on. That's gone wild. The Travis Scott. The price on. That's gone more. It's the same Royal Oak Quantum Perpetual. It's the same watch, of course. And so I'm paying double or triple or quadruple. Just because it's got John Mayer written on it.

Absolutely. And a lot of the components are going to be exactly the same.

Exact. The watch is exactly the same. It's just the dressing on the outside.

Exactly. Now, you might find that the youth. You will find that there'll be a very different movement in house from different company. Different. Different company. But usually they're using the same raw commodity materials. At the end of the day, if you just stripped away all the goodwill and looked at the product only that's in there. Yeah. The unit costs are going to be very, very similar. So why are the brands different in price? It's because of their brand positioning in the market and how you perceive the value of the product in the luxury watch marketplace. It's. It's bonkers at the end of the day.

And then. And then this has been exacerbated by the limited supply post Covid. Exacerbated probably by, you know, the luxury market doing really well. People at the higher end of the market, they can just chuck whatever money they want. So it pushes the price up further and then, you know, all this easy money that people are making in Bitcoin.

Yeah.

Like, you know, if you've made a view cash on the ball run in Bitcoin, you didn't have to earn and work for that. Yeah, yeah. Just take a bit out and buy a watch. And so it's become this self fulfilling thing now actually, where the watches I loved, I don't, I feel mugged off. I don't love them anymore. And I don't think, I don't think I'm the only one. And I don't think there's voices like me out there saying, wait a minute, you're taking the piss out of us.

Yeah.

Because I mean, I remember I had the all gold with the blue face. Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Quantum Perpetual. You know, the most elegant, brilliant looking watch. And know I paid in the 70s for it and it dropped a tiny bit but you know, maybe, maybe five odd percent and, and then they double, and then they double again and then they make the blue ceramic one, which is beautiful, but that thing's like 400 grams.

That's wild. 4.

And it's not even gold. Yeah, I know ceramic is hard to process. And I bought all these watches and, and, and like you don't get any goodwill. You don't get offered one unless you're a celeb.

So.

So now I've bought my first William Woodwork.

Very good.

I'm probably here looking at a boutique, disruptive British brand.

Absolutely.

Because I'm fucked off with these higher end brands.

Yeah, yeah.

And so you must, you must be loving it.

Yeah, we're loving it, Rob. Absolutely. But the story that you've just said there is what we see in customers coming to us every single day. We don't, we don't really see many customers who are buying our watches as a first watch purchase. These are people who already have a Patek, a Rolex.

So Kevin o'. Leary.

People like Kevin o'. Leary.

That's how I found out about your brand.

Exactly. Yeah.

And obviously he has his red strap.

He has his red strap because it happened really quick.

I saw Kevin o' Leary post this.

Yes.

So I, because I follow Kevin o'. Leary. I think he's great. And then I immediately saw who it was. And you. Yeah, and then I followed you and you followed me immediately back.

Absolutely.

And then, and then we started talking and then as it turns out, you know, you, you've been listening to my show.

So this, this was Kevin's watch here, actually, Rob. So. Because as you say, he actually loves red pieces.

Well, he has, he has a red strap.

He does, yeah, exactly. And we think we create one of the most authentic red watches in the world because that watch there actually is made from genuine upcycled firefighter equipment. The strap and within the watch as well, the chrono pusher buttons and the crown are made from a 100-year-old British brass firefighters helmet melted down in a furnace in London and then moulded into the chronograph buttons of the watch.

And why do you do that? What's the story behind that?

So the brand is dedicated to my grandfather. He was called William Wood. He was a firefighter up in Newcastle for over 25 years. Massive, massive role model in my life. Sadly, he passed away in 2009. But his legacy literally lives on in every single watch that we prod use. Every watch is completely different because we're taking fire department equipment from fire services around the world. Exactly.

So that's a specific part of the hose.

Yeah, yeah.

Right. So another strap will have a different part of the lettering.

Completely unique. Right, so. So it's almost like when you were talking about limited editions earlier. Like you genuinely have a1of1, because we're using equipment that can't be reused again inside each watch.

Now I want the red one as well.

Oh, there you go.

Yeah. Wow. Right. And this is the one that Kevin.

Kevin loves it. Yeah.

How did he find you?

Okay, so I've built up. I mean, I've been doing this for eight years now, so I've. I've built up a relatively strong network.

Just quickly when you say you've been doing this. So you've had the brand, William Wood, the British watchmaking brand, for eight years.

Yeah.

You started eight years ago.

Started it eight years ago, yeah. Founded it back in late 2016.

So the young. Young for a watch brand. I mean, some very young watch brands are 200 years old.

Exactly. Very young. And that's something that we're really proud of as well. We are really seen and viewed, Rob, as really in the top probably five to 10 independent watchmakers in Britain now. And that's an industry that dates back over 400 years, and we're only eight years in, you know.

Wow. Who would you. Who would you say at the top, then?

Well, the top by volume is a company called Christopher Ward. So they actually produce the most amount of watches by volume.

Okay. They're sort of. They Around a thousand mark.

Yeah. Some of their pieces go up to £4,000 as well. Fantastic team over there run by a wonderful founder as well, called Mike France.

Yeah.

And then you can't really have the conversation without putting Bremont in there as well. So Bremont did wonderful things to be able to really put British watchmaking on the map.

Yeah.

So you've got to throw them into the mix. But answering your question earlier about Kevin, Kevin o'. Leary. So I have a friend of a friend who's really well connected within the watch industry. He basically forwarded his details on to me and rather than just messing about, I thought, you know what, I'll just shoot Kevin a WhatsApp message. So I fired him. A voice message, I always say as well, a little hack. WhatsApp voice messages are so strong because you can actually get your authenticity and your passion into a message rather than just a text. Kevin loved the idea. He was over in Dubai at the time actually viewing, I think some sheikh's crazy watch collection. And it just so happened that he was going to be in Geneva. Now I live in, I moved to the south of France two years ago after living in London for 10 years. It's a four and a half hour drive from Geneva and we met over there and I was on Kevin o' Leary's podcast in Geneva when he was at Watches and Wonders and that was where we talked about about the watch. He's just ran off and enjoy. He's loving it now. So to give you an idea, he also just took the watch off on the podcast from the Nelk Boys. Yeah, that video got over a million views and all the comments was really just about the William would watch that Kevin presented.

Well, everyone knows how passionate he is about watching.

He loves it. He loves it.

I love his quote where he says, the only reason I work and I money is earn money is to fund my watch addiction.

I'm sure, I'm sure. But you know, he's a lovely person. I know that on Shark Tank, yeah, they tried to pick them to be the sharkiest shark. But he's actually just a really down to earth guy who wants to support young entrepreneurs.

What's his story behind always strapping up on a red strap or a watch? Do you know.

I mean his name is sort of Abbreviated name is Mr. Wonderful. I don't know whether that has any kind of ties into red. It just seems like he loves the color red. Every single limited edition watch that he's ever had produced and bearing in mind big, big companies, luxury companies have produced them for him. He always puts it on a red, on a red strap and as soon as I spotted it, I just thought, I think we have one of the greatest red watches in the world. Because red is a color, Rob, that you don't see too often. Let's be honest.

In a watch you do in lingerie, you do enlargerie. Yeah. Well, it depends on how good your relationship is with your wife. Yeah, that does definitely jumps with red. Okay, so myself, you and my business partner having a rant in our hallway about watch theft.

Yep.

So did you leave London because of all the. The theft and the crime and how London has gone to?

Love that pointed question. So London has definitely changed. Right. I've. I lived in London for 10 years. When I moved to London, it was slightly after the 2012 Olympics. Everyone was on a hiatus. London was epic. Right. London is a city of experiences. At the end of the day, that's where I met my now wife as well. So it's given me so much. It also gave me an exceptional banking career which accelerated me to be able to produce a luxury watch company. I tell you, what killed London, in my opinion, was Covid. The restrictions of COVID in London were absolutely insane. The bubbles that you had to abide by, people just don't want to go out in London anymore. Layered on top of the fact that everybody can now work from home. And there's obviously an argument as to. Is working from home as productive as being in the office? And I think. What do you think? So if I was an employee, I'd say working from home, I'm way more productive. I don't have to commute. I can just get straight out of my pajamas. I can stay in my pajamas and I can do my work. But as a, as a, as a founder and a CEO, I really think that productivity comes from being in the office. That's where you create the culture, that's why you create the environment. And London's just a different city as a result of it. Crime is becoming an increasing problem. Even when I just visited my sister the other day in Streatham Hill, there was a. A whole breakout with a. Basically a guy with a machete that just came running down the street. Yeah. Which is absolutely insane. Streatham Hill is a wonderful area. Yeah.

And have you seen. Is this true about all this watch crime and all these watches getting nicked?

Yeah. We see a lot of our customers who just don't want to carry or wear luxury watches at all now in London, I'd say, though, Rob, it's not just London, it's a lot of the major cities around the world too. Don't forget that.

Where people wear nice watches.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And that's. And again, that plays into our favor because our watches are priced between a thousand pounds to four thousand Pounds. So that gives people the opportunity to be able to wear them with comfort knowing that, yes, a thousand pounds is still a lot of money to some people. Even if they lose £1,000, it's, it's not like having an RM stolen, you know.

Yeah, right. And have you benefited from customers? Because people want more daily watches that aren't going to get recognized because, you know, maybe there's a benefit that William Wood isn't as recognized as Rolex.

I believe so, yeah. I really feel that is the case with our higher end collectors. Because this is the beautiful thing about owning an independent watch company. Your customers range from really, really high end, high horology collectors.

Kevin o' Leary's of the world.

Kevin o', Leary, Yeah. But even bigger than Kevin o'.

Leary, who else then has got one of your watches? Name drop.

President Biden. We produced a watch for the president of the U.S. wow. So that was handed over in the White House in July earlier this year by the 14 year old son of the most senior firefighter in America. After the meeting, we heard exactly how it went down and it was really quite funny because Biden invited in a whole load of firefighters into the Oval Office. He overran completely with the time he was spending lots of time with his William Wood watch, trying it on everything, loving it. And then one of the people from the press office kept coming in saying, you've got another meeting. And he was like, I'm with the firefighters, leave me alone. And he took them down the corridor, shown them the old oil paintings of all the previous presidents, ran over by like a good hour and a half. Now, whether he's wearing the watch or stuck it in a sock drawer, I've got no idea. But we got it. To Biden, it seemed like he loved it in the Oval Office. And again, it's quite remarkable, Rob, that only eight years ago this was just an idea that I had. And that's just, just one example. So we've got Russell Crowe, you know, one of my favorite ever actors he now owns. In the last eight weeks he's bought four of our watches, two of our Dunkirk watches which are here. That's like a 4,000 pound watch.

Yeah. Can I have a look at that one?

Yeah, of course. And he's going to be wearing the watch in his latest movie. He actually requested to do that.

Right.

And we'll be having a special thanks in the credits to William Wood Watches for being his watch supplier.

Wow.

Even just the other day, we're in New York, we're at a Watches of Switzerland cocktail party. A gentleman who had sold his business for billions said, you know what, I was just at Wind Up Watch fair the other day, which we were exhibiting at. And he said, my favorite brand out of 160 that attended with a firefighter brand that upcycles firefighter equipment. William Wood. So you just never know the people that you're impacting as you build up a brand.

Yeah. So how much money did you have to put in to start a watch brand? Okay, just before you answer this, it's not the easiest industry to crack, is it? It's a bit like launching a car company or an insurance company. I mean, there are hundreds of years of old brands.

Tell me about this.

I mean, Rolex, you know, how much power do they have? So it's not the easiest business to start.

It's not. But. But also timing is everything. In 2016, the market was so different to what it is now. It's even more competitive now. It's like every day I'm seeing a new watch start up.

I see it.

Yeah. Because the barrier to entry rob so low. At the end of the day, if you fly out to one of these Swiss watch fairs or if you want to go to a Hong Kong watch fair to produce more affordable pieces, you can speak and look at the whites of the eyes of a factory owner and literally produce one of your designs immediately. As a result of that, I actually.

It takes quite a lot of money to do that.

It does it. So I invested £25,000 initially into the launch of our first collection. Now, the reason that that was lower than usual.

That's quite good.

It's not bad at all.

I thought it'd be hundreds of thousands.

Well, usually it is, but that's because we started with a quartz dress watch.

Right.

So by doing that, it's a battery operated movement which has a 10 year battery life. Yeah, we did that eight years ago. Every single collection we've ever released since then is a mechanical movement watch. That's when the unit cost increases a lot. So that's why our overheads were much lower. But I'm so blessed and thankful that we did that because that then gave us the ability to take those pre orders, sell all the batch and give us the opportunity to finally produce our first mechanical watch.

Right, so you reinvested the profits of the quartz watch back into building what you believe to be a higher quality watch.

Exactly. And if your listeners really want to know how we did it, I found out about a crowdfunding platform called Kickstarter. So at the time, basically what that does is it allows people to be able to pre order your product, there's a landing page, you can create your own video of the product and exactly what your entrepreneurial vision is. Now there's a big warning that says you are investing in an entrepreneur's vision. You might lose your, your order because the deal might not go ahead.

So you use Kickstarter to raise the 25 grand by forward selling watches.

Exactly.

So this is great.

Yeah. So then, so then it's kind of.

Almost no money down. In a way it is, but the.

25K that I quoted was in web development costs, product development, sampling, design fees. Yeah. You know, to be able to get to that stage. Okay.

And so you, there's an outsourced company that you use to make these watches.

Yes. So there's a very intricate supply chain where you'll have a dial supplier, hand supplier, case supplier, strap supplier, and it all comes together and then the assembly is all done and then it's all quality controlled. And we ship everything from, from the uk.

Right. And then will there be a goal ever to make it all in house?

I would say no. Okay. The reason I would say no, because we're already producing freaking awesome watches right now with people who already have 50 plus years experience of making watches. So why would we go from 50 years of experience right down to zero? And the other thing is, what's the cost versus reward? Rob, If I then said to our customers, every rott watch is going to go up in retail price by a thousand pounds or fifteen hundred pounds to have everything assembled in house, I really think the customer would turn out and say, well, I actually just prefer the way that it is now because one of the dichotomies that we have is we need to make sure that we are affordable for a firefighter and first responder, all the way up to somebody who really appreciates a luxury watch.

Yeah.

So our entry price, Quartz watch is £500. Our Dunkirk watch is £4,000. The average retail price is about a thousand to two and a half thousand pounds. And that's the challenge that we always have. We can't really be getting into the arena of producing 50,000 pound watches in house because you're going to start to lose the essence of the brand. And I see that happen so often with brands.

So are you saying then really that the whole in house everything and in house movement, it's really a bit overrated and maybe it's kind of like a.

Marketing story that is the number one Key differentiator that allows the big Swiss luxury giants to charge the money that they do is because they've invested, I'd say a minimum of 20 million euros into a Swiss manufacturing facility to be able to produce their own in house movement. By doing that, that is the, that is the pure way that they can crush anybody else and say the reason that we're charging is at least 5k because really entry level 5k up to hundreds of thousands of pounds is because we produce our watches in house and we have an in house movement.

But what you've just said makes me think like that's slightly mugging us off of the benefit of that. This recent budget should warn you that your pension is not safe and secure and they're coming for your inheritance. Do you even know how much is in your pension or where your pension is invested? Add to this the recent inheritance tax grab on your pensions and the risk of a market crash. You probably didn't know this and I didn't until recently, but physical gold can be added to your pension pot gold is inheritance tax free and has grown 700% in the last 20 years. You probably know from my content I'm investing heavily in silver and gold and that's why I've partnered with direct bullion. Myself and Nigel Farage are brand ambassadors and direct bullion can help you with with gold to protect and grow your pension. I buy my gold and silver from direct bullion and I don't earn any money on any purchases of gold or silver if you buy direct from direct bullion. So if you go to robmore.directbullion.com you can get a great price on your silver and gold and you can get the pension gold investing guide completely for free. As you know, I don't do many strategic partnerships and when I do, I do them with people who are incredible, who've been doing it a long time, who invested things that I invest into and gold and silver's going wild. I'm investing heavily in gold and silver and I recommend you check out robmore.directbullion.com you're right.

I mean, at the end of the day, Rob, you are right.

Does it matter what house the what if the watch is good quality and quality control? Does it matter where it's assembled? Well, you would say no if you're.

A high horology connoisseur. Yeah, you're always going to want to have a Swiss luxury watch. To be fair, Germany's doing great things at the minute as well. But you're always going to want to have that.

That's in the uk.

Roger is fantastic and he's doing wonderful things. And also that meticulous craftsmanship of only producing I think less than 10 watches a year is just remarkable. Talk about a sort of tailored watch, you know?

Yeah, yeah. And this because it feels like it's better to have a tailored watch from someone who can do a really good tailored job rather than just, you know, a big Swiss brand who'll mark up hundreds of thousands to tailor you a watch.

But we say that and then you look at the sales of some of these Swiss luxury giants and they're still knocking in huge sums of sales.

By the way. I say this as a die hard Odemar Piguet fan. Yeah, As a die hard, yeah. Patek Philippe fan.

Yeah.

Although pre Covid they used to look after me, take me around the world, treat me like the client that I am. Spending loads of money on their watches and then after lockdown something changed.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, 100%.

I don't give a fuck anymore.

No.

Whereas IWC, they, they ship me all around the world and they care and I know that they're trying to, I feel like they're trying to sort of elevate their brand up.

Yeah. I just. Yeah.

But then they're probably, AP and Patek are probably still killing it. They're probably still making massive profits.

Oh, they're doing huge sums. But you not think as well. The reason for that is you could almost push past marketing into brainwashing where every single sporting event that you turn on you will always see the branding of a luxury watch at some point. Yeah.

And you're paying for that. And the cost of 20 million to set up in house, you're paying for.

Of course.

So is your argument then that your watches that are sub foreground might be as good quality because you're not paying for all the advertising and the in house build.

You've hit the nail on the head. Yeah. You would be shocked at how many of the same components which are in our watches that is in the same Swiss luxury watch that you own.

I wouldn't be shocked. I personally wouldn't. I mean I remember back in the day and actually, you know, I purchased this but Rolex used to make watches with Zenith movements because Zenith, they have a brilliant movement and then they move to their in house movements even though actually the zenith movement's probably better and now the ones with the Zenith movement go up in value more.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And the Zenith movement is, is, I believe the Most accurate movement in the world still to this day.

Yeah.

But again, it's having complete control over your supply chain. I mean, the other thing is, it's such a challenge because these companies, at the end of the day, just have limitless, limitless pockets and marketing funds. And a lot of them as well, have really aggressive private equity investment where at the end of the day, you're having to show to shareholders.

Yeah.

You know, so.

Yeah. And I get that. Owned by Richemont or someone.

Yeah, of course. Of course. And look at the conglomerate that they have. When you start to be able to have a dominance within a conglomerate and you have multiple brands and you can buy cases and share the watch cases across many different brands, or for instance, you can literally buy Bouchera so that you can actually own the retailer that has your watches in then starts to get just difficult because you're moving into the realms of monopolies, then is it fair? You know, but again, there is enough space in the marketplace. I'm certainly finding that even just eight years in with us, it's absolutely remarkable just how much you can access new. How quickly you can access new markets.

Yeah.

And how quickly, even through word of mouth as well. I think people underestimate the power of word of mouth when you're dealing with influential people these days. Once they've got your watch on their wrist. Yeah.

And putting it on social media.

Exactly.

Yeah. Okay. So will you always remain a disruptive, independent boutique watch brand doing what you do now the way you do it, or would you embrace scaling up to the size of Rolex or Patek Philippe?

Right. It's a really interesting question. I honestly believe, like, at the core of my heart, and I would never have started the company eight years ago if I didn't have this relentless belief. Because at the end of the day, if I had said eight years ago that I've got an idea to produce a firefighter watch company as a. As a banker, people would have said, and they did say, you're absolutely mental. Eight years on. They're not saying that now. You know, when the likes of all those people that we talked about own one of these things, I believe that if a Richemont group were to own William Wood Watches, now, the question is, is, would I ever sell when it's got my grandfather's name on the dial? That's a hard question. And I know there's people say, would.

You or wouldn't you?

Well, I know people say that there's always a number, but at the end of the Day I absolutely love what I do and to be able to carry my grandfather's legacy on, donate back.

1 million 100 million for 49 share in William Wood. But you know, they've got aggressive growth plans in Europe.

Do you know what I'd say though Rob? 10 million, 100 million. My life wouldn't change much. Okay. I have a very private life. The company's doing well. All our focus on is bottom line. So we're a highly profitable company. We travel all around the world, we do everything that we want to do. So even if we were to have those sums of money, our life wouldn't change that much. I certainly wouldn't be jumping on private jets. I'd probably just put the whole thing in a trust fund for my future kids generation.

Maybe you could get William Wood known globally, you know, because surely the name.

But we're do, we're doing great at that already. You know, I, I, I really think on the trajectory that we're on, just long term sustainable growth. I'm only 33, I've got 30 odd years ahead of me working, I think, yeah, just reinvesting on a long term sustainable basis. The reason I had that sort of carrot comment earlier was because I do believe that if a Richemont group bought it, Jesus. They could take William Wood watches into the billions in revenue. And why do I think that every single country in the world has a fire service? Our vision is to convert fire stations all around the world into our concept stores. So you take a closed fire station on London high street, New York high street, in Hong Kong high street. It has all the original features. We've got a fire engine, old vintage fire engine, you got the shutters at the back. And we sell watches from the glass. Driving around the country. Imagine that experience, you know, and Richemont.

Could find that for you.

But this is what I'm saying. Like if somebody was to have that angle, it could go stratospheric. It just comes down to the fact of do I want my grandfather's legacy to be handed over? Because let's be honest, you get bought out, your ownership goes to 49%, you sit on the board, you're the sitting CEO for two years, you slowly start to see that they're casting you to one side. Your ideas aren't really getting through anymore because the Richemont board want to take it in a certain direction. And in two years time you have a hostile takeover, you're pushed out and it's got William Wood watches, your grandad's Name on the dial and you can't do shit about it. You know, does that sound good?

I mean, it sounds, it sounds. I hear the stories of things like that happening fairly commonly all the time. You know, I have many entrepreneur friends who've exited in that way and had that experience.

Yeah.

What you could do though is wait for them to up in five years, buy it back for a pound. Because some of my friends have done that.

Seriously?

Yeah. Yeah. Because that is unfortunately the case where generally, you know, private equity or, you know, external money coming in and then taking over. They don't know your business.

Sure.

So I think from this, what you're saying is you want to carry on doing it how you're doing it.

Yeah. I mean, what we can do without investors, without debt, without anybody to answer to, with a small team, and this is something that I'm super passionate about, is I think society is celebrating the wrong businesses. We are feeding a conversation around entrepreneurs who have these big billion dollar companies with huge employees, masses, potentially masses of debt. Okay. I know profitability is a lot more focused now than it was pre2020, but I think we should be celebrating more the entrepreneurs that are turning over maybe into the single digit millions, less than 10 employees. Highly profitable. Give a lot back to charity and give a lot back in taxes as well.

Well, the small business is about 55% of the economy in the UK. Yeah. And small businesses defined as 10 million or under.

Yeah.

So actually they are the heart and soul of the, of the country and the economy and they're getting completely undermined by the current government.

100%. But also, Rob, kudos to you for having obviously our company on today, but when you look at other podcasters, they just have the big billion dollar CEOs on. Yes, it's great after a while, but do you not think that the average person that's trying to set up their own company thinks, how the hell am I going to go from my current job to the CEO of a billion dollar company? The answer is you don't have to. You can.

Well, the answer is you can't. Because there's a journey, isn't there?

So why aren't they getting more entrepreneurs on who turn over, let's say 5 million pound a year, 2 million pound EBITDA, profitable business. You have total freedom over your life. Why aren't we celebrating those kind of entrepreneurs 55 of the time? If they make up 55% of the market, it's, it's just nuts.

Well, you are here.

Yeah.

And the CEO of Richmond isn't.

Yeah.

So, yeah, doing kudos. Right?

Yeah.

But if you want. If it was a question and it wasn't rhetorical, the answer is the algorithms and what people want. So I get loads of haters online. They don't really hate me. I just trigger them and they're like, why are you posting this? And insert expletive. I don't want to see stuff like this on my feed. And I just say, well, if you don't engage in this, you won't see this in your feed. And if you engage in the content of mime that you like, you'll see more of it. Yeah, but we're our own worst enemy in that we end up responding to the things that trigger us. You know, stuff that's divisive, controversial, polarizing, emotionally triggering. And actually, the things that matter, we don't engage in. So as a humanity, we blame the algorithms, but the algorithms are feeding us what we've shown it wants. So we need to support and encourage meaningful content and meaningful entrepreneurs. You are here.

Yeah.

And stop engaging in all the clickbait and the nonsense.

But who are these people? Like, I look at my own social media habits, and I'm not leaving like, you know, like, trollish content comments, you know, on posts that I'm seeing.

No, but.

But I hear what you're saying. Some of the biggest reels that have gained us the most amount of followers through the business have been ones where actually negative comments have fed the real, which has then blown it up to millions of views and gained us.

That's how it works.

It's wild.

I mean, I have a theory, and I think it's just because I think we're more wired sociologically to respond to negative than we are positive. I mean, if you think about our ability to survive as a human, we need to be more aware of the threat than we are of the attainment of the pleasure.

Yeah.

So, you know, I remember 15 years ago, I always used to think, wouldn't it be great to set up a news brand that only shared positive news? It would be great and it would flop and be a disaster and no one would read it because, you know, we're shit, bad news.

Fuck what we got.

Did you hear about it's in us as a human nature? And that's why I think people get triggered and write troll comments. Yeah, but actually, if we all took a bit of responsibility and went, you know, I believe in supporting what you believe is right, not just bitching about what you disagree with.

Yeah.

So we should, you know, I. I support small business. You know, I. I buy watches from, you know, people like yourself and I tip and I pay cash in taxes and I go to local restaurants and anyone that's starting a business, I let them share their business on my social media. And I support small business. And I think if we all did.

That, the world would change a hundred percent. But it's getting harder and harder. Why is it getting harder and harder? When you look at companies like Amazon, where at the click of a button, you know, I try and do exactly the same thing. I would be a hypocrite as an independent founder if I didn't buy independent products. And that's what I try and do at every turn.

But it's hard.

It's difficult, man.

And also the speed of delivery, the service is really good, the returns are easy.

But also, I think you have to be in a financial position to be able to do it, because, let's be honest, if you buy well, it'll last longer, but it's way more expensive because at the end of the day, it's not sort of put into this massive machine. It's usually handcrafted. There's actually heart and soul that's gone into it because it is more expensive. Let's be honest. You go and buy something in Zara or you go into a British handmade wool jumper shop, it's going to be a lot more expensive. So I think you have to be in a financial position to be able to do it as well. And not everybody's in that position.

No, but you can start 100%. Start with buying local foods, for example. Yeah, yeah. So was it a big risk to you to start your own independent, disruptive watch brand? You're in the banking industry for 10 years, you're obviously making good money there, I assume. Was it a big risk? Did you, you know, sacrifice? Was it hard? You know, did you have a family to feed? Tell us about that startup process.

Sure. Rob. The first two years of running William at Watches were the hardest years of my life. I don't think people.

And you did that in your early 20s?

I did it. I started at 25.

You set up a watch brand, age 25?

Yeah.

There's not many people that do that.

It's wild, isn't it? But I had a very entrepreneurial father. My dad had me on. Rich dad, poor dad. Not even. Not just the book. Yeah. But the cash flow board game at the age of like 14 or 15 or something.

He's done good.

He did do well, yeah, so I'm very. Not many people say that they were grateful to have a financial advisor as a dad, but I was really chuffed. Yeah, um, it was a major, major risk. And there were moments as well where I went so hard on it in those first two years that it put such a strain on, on relationships, you know.

Were you single or were you with someone when you started?

No, my, my wonderful wife, who was my girlfriend at the time, was with me from the very beginning. But I'll be honest, going from your full attention being just a job that you can really handle a 9 to 5, into trying to juggle that and grow an incredible watch company and be able to give enough attention to your future wife, it was very, very hard.

So you started your watch brand while you were working in the banking world.

That's exactly what I did.

And banking is not exactly small hours.

No, and it's not. And what I will say as well is I didn't let my head drop once. So what I would say is, if you're going to. Because I would actually recommend, I always say, such a major risk to just quit work. I think they say get alone and leave home. You know, I think it's such a ballsy move. I would always recommend if you have a job and you can just grit your teeth and get through it, that's your security at the end of the day. So I built it up for the first two years whilst holding down the full time job. As you say, it was golden handcuffs because I was doing really well in work on a good six figure salary at the time.

Yeah.

And I'm so blessed though that that gave me the ability to be able to fund it. Ultimately it got to the point where two years in, I mean, for instance, I won the Entrepreneur of the Air award through Esquire magazine. Esquire magazine was in the freaking reception of the bank I worked in and I hadn't told my bank yet. So at one point I had to pull my boss to one side and say, listen, grab that magazine, I've got to tell you something. Yeah. And luckily he was super, super inspired and supportive and we registered it with compliance because you got to make sure there's no conflict of interest. And from then on it was game on. And what was funny about that was by winning the Entrepreneur of the Year award through Esquire, I was actually given a 20,000 pound lease through WeWork overlooking St. Paul's Cathedral for four members of my team. I couldn't use it, right, because I had to use it within the year. And so I just had to like, give away an office basically for 20,000 pound lease. And it wasn't something that I ended up being able to make the most of, but I would. I would massively recommend that you build up a company whilst holding down the job.

Yeah.

And yes, it was. It was a major, major stress and risk, but paid off in the end.

And how many watches will you make in 2025?

We produce about three and a half thousand pieces a year. Average retail price, anything between 1 and 2,000 pounds. So I think you can do the maths there.

Yeah.

Pretty. Pretty good numbers, really, for.

Do you want to make more or push up your price?

I think it's inevitable because we are starting to see our B2B business begin to overtake our D2C business. Now, this is very.

Sell B2B.

Okay. Because we are the only watch brand in the world to do what we do. We can now approach fire departments around the world and look for government contracts where they order watches from us with the fire department crest in the back, the payroll number of every firefighter, and it be commissioned as part of the firefighter uniform.

Oh, wow.

So rather than us just trying to sell D2C through the website, you can sell larger, larger order volumes to government bodies, to fire departments.

Would you have to sell them for less money?

No.

No.

Why? We're the only company in the world to do what we do, Rob.

Yeah.

So we don't discount.

No.

This is the thing that I think sometimes, this is what I've seen from the very outset. We really are the only people to do what we do. Even if you try to copy our watch, you can't take away the story. At the end of the day, I am genetically the relative to William Wood, who was my grandfather, who was a firefighting hero in Newcastle. If you want the greatest luxury product in the world to pay homage to a firefighter, it's us in every single country on the planet, you know, so this is where we see huge opportunities because now the larger contracted order volumes are coming through where usually we can see a minimum of a thousand watches ordered.

Wow.

Which is, you know, a game changer.

Has anyone ever bought any of your watches in bitcoin?

No, we haven't actually got the website set up to be able to accept bitcoin. In hindsight, that would have been pretty good, wouldn't it, back in 2016 if we did the crowdfunding campaign.

I imagine more and more people are going to want to pay for your watches in bitcoin because obviously they made it very easily.

Yeah, I'm sure, yeah. And I always remember the, the turnaround of 50 Cent when he sold one of his albums. It was at the point where I think he was struggling financially a bit before obviously the vitamin water and yeah, Bitcoin obviously rose and it put him back into a, onto an even playing field again.

Do you care if these go up or down in value? The second hand market? Do you care about the value?

We don't see many customers selling their watches because they're buying the watch out of the love of the purchase. Okay. When you look at our trustpilot reviews like some of them are so sentimental and beautiful because the watches are so damned unique and special to who they are as people. So you don't really see many flippers as such. So it's actually quite hard to determine now when we've produced very small runs of limited edition pieces. I'm talking 30 pieces at a time. Yes. Those watches are instantly three times more valuable. We know that. I mean, if you take the watch that I'm wearing.

Say that one again. The Dunkirk.

This one here is a collaboration with a London fire brigade fireboat that saved over 600 lives off the beaches of Dunkirk in World War II. Okay.

Yeah.

The back of the watch of this one has an actual piece of the engine from the fireboat that sailed into Dunkirk in 1940. Given to us, machine cut and put in the back of the watch.

Yeah.

So you actually, you own a real piece of World War II history on your wrist.

Yeah.

Now if you had a grandparent who fought in World War II, would you tell me that that's a priceless watch to be able to bring you one step closer to your ancestry, history, who actually gave, gave their lives, you know, in World War II. So that retails for £4,000. But at the end of the day, we see that as a priceless work of art.

Yeah. Right. And how many of these did you make?

We've got the ability to make up to 600 pieces.

Right.

And that's to commemorate the 600 lives saved by the boat.

Right. And you've got number one.

Absolutely.

Of course you've got number one. Is that what you do? You just make all the watches and you keep number ones?

Everyone I have is number one.

Yeah, yeah, I would do that. Right, so you will make up to 600 of these and then stop.

Yeah.

And which watch of yours did you make? 30.

We did a watch called the British Coronation Watch. It was celebrating the coronation of the, the New King of England. It came out just after the Jubilee watch.

So William Wood, what did you say it was called?

King's Coronation. And it's finished in a bronze case with a Union Jack British racing green dial. And it's got.

Oh, is it that one?

Yes. It's absolutely insane. Bronze case, Union Jack, British racing green dial, pressure pump gauge, hands finished in candy anodized green. And the straps are made from upcycled British racing green fire hose. And the back of the watch has a green sapphire crystal, again with a laser engraved Union Jack. Right.

Are they all sold? How do I get one of those, Rob?

They were gone. You know, if there was one mess up that we made was not making way more of that watch. We get messaged even today about that watch.

Yeah, I mean, so this is bronze.

Yeah, yeah.

Because the bronze and the green go really well, don't they?

Yeah, they're lovely.

Right, so why did you make 30 of those? 250 of these 1 that I've got.

We class that one more as a core collection watch. So whenever there's a milestone like the King's coronation or the Queen's jubilee or our five year anniversary, we made a 55 piece watch for our five year anniversary as a company.

What's that one?

So if you type in William Wood watches. Bronze. Amethyst.

Bronze Amethyst, yes.

Because amethyst is the gemstone of five years. And this one is cool.

Is this the purple one?

Yes, but it's got a different take to it.

Okay, so is it the chrono or is it.

No, it's that one there. Yeah, it's just the. The three hand automatic. Yeah, so you'll see that on the sandwich dial. The number five has a five, five cutout indices. Yeah, it's got a beautiful metallic shimmer purple effect with a purple bezel bronze case. And the back of the watch, you'll see on the image 2 to the left has a purple flame with a number five cutout that looks into the inner workings of the watch.

Right.

That was limited to 55 pieces.

Right. Do you have any of them?

We launched that. We do.

Because you have number one of all of these.

I'm not selling any of my number ones.

Right, yeah, you've definitely got my interest.

We launched that watch when I arrived at the pyramids of Giza. I know this is a random story. By the time I got off the bus, all of them were gone.

Right, I need to get one of these kings coronation ones. All right, I'm gonna leave that Up.

Okay. Yeah. Is that your new wallpaper? Yeah.

Look at that. I actually don't. I am. I like green on a watch, but I don't own one because I've never. It's quite a unique statement and it's.

Yeah.

It's not really my normal color, so I don't yet have a green watch.

I'm surprised you haven't gone purple with the screen that we're sat in front of behind you here.

Yeah, true.

You know.

Yeah. Maybe in this one that you might make me. Maybe we make a purple face. Does gold and purple look good together?

It looks beautiful.

Yeah.

Because we've done bronze and purple, which looks gorgeous. Yeah. I know that the gold tone would look wonderful. Yeah.

And what's the price of bronze like at the moment?

It's not bad.

Yeah.

We can make a good, good price point on a bronze.

Yeah. Because maybe bronze.

Yeah.

I mean, I like gold, but I don't know. That bronze looks really good.

Yeah.

Is bronze heavy bronze?

It's a similar weight to stainless steel, but it's stronger than stainless steel.

Yeah.

And the thing that you've got to be aware of with bronze, Rob, is when the watch comes, it's going to look brand new, almost rose gold, but then it's gonna patina and age over time.

Yeah. Which I like.

I love it.

Yeah.

I always say let Mother Nature take its course so that it can actually weather over time. But some customers, you know, you can get bronze back to brand new again. Little bit of lemon juice, little bit of baking soda, toothbrush, 20 minute Sunday job and it's back to brand new again.

Right, okay. Let's do a bit of quick fire questions.

Okay, hit me.

How can you spot a fake watch from a real watch?

Weight is a big element to it.

Well, they're normally lighter.

Yeah, normally much lighter. Yes. The inner workings of the movement. You normally have to open it up if it's going to be a closed case, back to the back of it, the end. Replicas are getting very strong these days, though. So if you pay £500 for a replica, it's. It's going to look like the real thing. Wow.

I know some people who now buy fakes to wear them in London in case they get nicked.

Really?

I mean, how mad is the world? I know, because we were talking out there and you were saying, oh, yeah, you know, I just don't want to wear these watches out. Don't you buy a watch to want to wear it?

Yes.

Isn't a watch like really for most Men, the only form of jewelry they're going to have.

Yes.

It. Doesn't it say so much about who you are?

Yes.

And now we can't wear them in London because they get nicked and we're buying fakes instead.

Exactly.

What the.

Tell me about it. All you can do is literally open up your safe and just admire and look at it or wear it around the house.

Well, I don't leave my watches in my house in case they come to.

Seriously. See, I'm like a lockbox or something. Yeah.

But even if I have a safe or three saves in my house, if they come in with a knife to my kid's throat. Yeah, they're opening the safe.

Exactly.

So I don't keep anything in the house.

Yeah.

So I can't even look at it.

It's wild.

So I need to travel, what, 100 miles to go and look at it.

Yeah. It's crazy, isn't it? Yeah, but. But yet why is it so different with luxury cars? You know, I'm a big fan of cars. You can still drive a car around without being too worried about the car being stolen.

I think cars are harder to nick, aren't they? In some way?

Yeah, I guess with the chassis number and. Yeah, yeah. And.

But also the ability to do it. Didn't you say now in France they're just driving on go karts and just swiping it. Yeah, you said that.

Yeah. Down in the south of France, at the beach clubs, you've got to be very aware now.

So you just come along on a moped or a golf cart and just swipe your watch.

Exactly. So you've got to. This is the thing, you can't really ever have a chill anywhere in the world now even normally in a luxury environment, you've always got to have your wits about you. Now there's obviously countries which don't accept it in places like Dubai or Saudi, et cetera, but it's just, it's becoming a scarier world. I think being able to show your success through materialistic objects is getting harder to do now. I don't know if you see that more and more where people are almost trying to sort of hide wealth less so much in the U.S. okay. Yeah. The U.S. is completely different. I think. I love their mentality. They have such a glass half full mentality. Yeah. I think in Britain it's such a glass half empty mentality, you know? Yeah. You almost feel bad sometimes for. For just actually trying to get ahead in life.

Yeah. That kind of sucks. What is the most overrated watch brand in your opinion?

I mean, I don't want to, I don't want to name Take a shot. No, I don't want to name it, but I'd say it's got to be.

The one that, just say it like this. It will hold them accountable to get better. So you'll be doing them a favor.

It's got to be the one that everybody recognizes. When you rock up to somewhere like Wimbledon and you see the clocks all around there, evidently you're gonna know who. There's just so much marketing that goes into it now that you can buy.

A better watch easily better watch for less money.

Yeah, but what I do understand at the same time is when you own one of those watches, it is a statement. It's shown that you're doing well. And at the end of the day, let's be honest, that is usually everybody's first purchase in the collection before the other watch comes.

So this watch brand that you didn't want to name that everyone buys as their first luxury watch probably are a good gateway for people to understand watches like you.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And at the end of the day you're going to be able to know what a good watch feels like, you know.

But why they overrated in your opinion?

Because, because I know the value that goes into producing a watch. I know if you think that we can produce watches, we can produce a Swiss made watch for anything between 1500 pounds, the fire exit watch up to our Triumph collection watch at two and a half thousand pounds. Straight away, look at those prices, Rob. And then look at the prices of even the second hand market of those pieces.

Well, often they're even more.

Yeah, of course, because they're controlling how many watches are in the marketplace. They actually, it's almost like they, they want to feed that secondhand.

So they're playing, they're playing with the supply.

Yeah, 100%.

So when they say you can't have one that you actually probably could, they're controlling. Because I've heard stories of you go into say for example Rolex and you want say for example a Daytona, you can't get one of them. It's a nine year waiting list. But they've got some in the safe and if you really want one or if you're really the right name of person, you can actually get one. Does that go on?

I'm sure that does go on. I'm sure that does happen. There's been many times that I've gone into watch boutiques and I'VE seen the sort of cliche label against the watch that says exhibit. Yeah.

Piece only I. E. We don't have any stock.

Yes, yes. And that sat prim and proper right at the front to sort of get you into the showroom. And I say, I want that one and you can't get it.

Yeah.

But at the same time, it's not just watches, it's all across different industries, let's be honest, cars. But human mentality is if you are told that you don't want, you can't have something, you go away wanting it even more.

Like this King's Coronation.

You can't have that, Rob.

Yeah, you've got one. You've got the one of one.

Can't have that.

If we get a million views on this, can I have it?

No.

All right, what's the most underrated watch brand in your opinion?

William Wood Watches.

Okay, what's the second most underrated watch brand in your opinion?

Underrated watch brand. Let me think. There's a really cool company out there that I like called Reservoir. Reservoir is a company that takes inspiration from vintage automobiles. So again, they're a bit of. I'm super passionate about cars and classic cars, vintage supercars, hyper cars. So just the way that they construct their pieces, it just ticks my boxes.

Right, so they, they look like dials on cars.

Yeah, yeah. Like vintage racing instruments. Yeah.

I'd never known this brand, but there's.

So many companies out there that people have never heard of.

Yeah, yeah. And I think it's great to support these. And at the end of the day, you can get yourself into some nice watches before they blow up. Before they're really ridiculously priced.

Of course.

Yeah.

Have you heard, I guess you've heard of MB&F. Yes. Yeah. So Max, the owner of MB&F, I mean, again, what he's doing is wonderful things. That's like literally seeing an artist in motion.

Yeah.

You know, when you put one of his pieces on, it's. It's like a work of art. So, again, I mean, I wouldn't say it's underrated. It's very, very admired.

Yeah.

But it's just beautiful to be able to see what you can. What you can do with a watch.

Yeah. All right, I've got a few more watches to check out after this.

Okay.

What do you think is the best entry level watch for investment?

Entry level watch for investment. I mean, let's be honest, the amount of people who have bought a tag for their 18th birthday, that's a pretty good Beta, you know, that's a pretty good daily wearer. It's got a wonderful stainless steel 316L grade bracelet to it. It's got a fantastic movement in it. It's well priced and you would hope that it's going to hold its value at least maybe from the age of 18 through to your mid-20s. So I'd say that's a good one to get, get your hands on. Obviously the go to brand that everybody's going to say is Rolex.

Yeah.

But again, you're going to be on a wait list for maybe 12, 18, 24 months or you're going to be pushed into buying a, a piece that maybe isn't the one that you actually wanted to get your hands on.

Yeah. Have you heard of Meister Zinger?

Yeah, of course, yeah, yeah.

Because they're quite well priced, aren't they?

Yeah, they're lovely pieces. Yeah. Really well constructed. Wonderful dials on those watches. Great movements. Yeah.

If there's one watch brand that you could run and own, whether it's because you love them or you would change what they do, which one would it be and what would you do?

So this is quite controversial because I've been asked this question before, Rob, and I do have an answer for it. I'm going to jump from luxury watches and analog watches into the digital world and I'd say Apple smart watches. Okay.

Right.

If I could be the founder or the, or the CEO of running Apple watches, that's pretty damn cool because especially with the type of watches that we produce. At the end of the day, firefighters are an active job. The one challenge that we always have is a third of all firefighters, usually in every developed country in the world has a smartwatch and it's usually an Apple watch because they want to track their stairs, climb the heart rate because it's an active job. So I would just find it very, very interesting being on the other side of the fence for once to look at something which is digitally led and technology led and also look into how the Apple iOS systems feed into that one watch I think would be really cool. Now it's super controversial to say because digital watches almost killed the luxury watch industry, similar to quartz watches. When quartz batteries came out, we thought that mechanical watches were done for. But I do think no matter how developed a digital watch goes, you're always going to want a true enthusiast is always going to want a beautifully built mechanical watch.

Yeah. I think the reason the luxury watch market probably ended up benefiting from digital is because it made it More of a piece of jewelry. Because a digital watch is not a piece of jewelry, nor is a smartwatch. In fact, when you make smartwatch as a piece of jewelry, like I saw when Apple brought out gold versions that I knew that was going to tank and fail. Yeah. Because it. But it's pretty much the only piece of jewelry that the average man can and will wear that doesn't want to feminize themselves by wearing loads of other jewelry. And people pay ridiculous amounts of jewelry.

Yeah, exactly. There's two things for men, isn't there? There's watches and cars and so you could say whiskey as well. There's such a synergy between certain industries, but men really have two ways to be able to show their personality, and that's through a nice watch and a nice car.

You know, on the night of these smart watches, then, I mean, it could be a fascinating thing for you to do to make a watch for firefighters that's a smart watch. You know, with these government contracts that you're getting. Have you ever thought about that or do you think it would ruin the integrity of your mechanical watches?

I think the latter. I think it's going to ruin the integrity of who we are. At the end of the day, if we are a British luxury watchmaker, it sort of flies in the face of the industry to be able to move into. Into digital watches. But hell, there's a. There's a huge possible gag.

They're trying to do it, aren't they? Yeah, they are.

And they're making good watches at the minute, to be fair. And they're doing good in the, in the golf arena too.

Yeah.

It just shows if you get the athletes on board, everybody follows, right?

Yeah.

To be fair, there is a company that we are working with who actually produce the dials for smart watches that you can buy and download from an app store. So if you wanted to download a William Wood dial to your smartwatch. Yeah, there is the possibility of that.

Right.

And it wouldn't just be a normal William Wood dial. It would be like a moving, let's say the wheel of a fire engine with William Wood on it. That would be your home screen.

Yeah.

So again, it's pretty great publicity for us that every time you look at your Apple watch, your smartwatch, you see William Wood. So that could be cool.

Yeah. So where can we find out about. Look into. Buy a William Wood watch.

Yes. So you can buy our watch from williamwood watches.com. you can also follow us on Instagramilliamwood watches is our handle. I also have a personal Instagram account which is JohnnyGarrettCEO and we are actually stocked with one of the most prestigious luxury watch retailers in the UK and the US Watches of Switzerland Group.

Oh wow.

So we're one of only, I think four British independents stocked with Watches of Switzerland. So you can walk into any of their 120 boutiques across watches of Switzerland, Goldsmiths, Mappin and Webb and you can order to have a watch sent to the store. You can try it on, purchase it, have a glass of champagne and walk out with your William Wood watch.

There you go. Perfect way to end. And I want to say thanks for bringing in some watches, of course to show us and it's been great to get to know you and thanks for being on the show.

Thanks, Rob. Appreciate it.

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