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Originally Posted by M3/4 life
Has anyone ever heard of this online company or bought a watch from them?
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Occasionally they have good prices. Always when I've tried their website, it takes forever to load. Now a slow loading website doesn't have a damn thing to do with the watches, but it does have something to do with the way the company is managed and operated. What it says to me is that they are too damn cheap to spend the money to have a well designed site that loads quickly or that they just don't give a damn. It could also mean they are a mom and pop sort of outfit and money's too tight to mention, which is entirely possible.
That said, if I were to have the opportunity to visit their brick and mortar location first and buy something that I knew well and could determine its authenticity myself, I probably wouldn't have any issue buying from them. I provided a BBB link below, but I haven't read what is contained there. I may change my mind depending on what I read.
I will say I read with a grain of salt a lot of reviews I read about various sellers. Competition among sellers is such that it's not beneath some of them to post bogus reviews. I just use good judgement to get a sense if it's just some loon ranting or whether the writer is someone who knows what they are talking about.
As for grey market sellers (GMS) in general, I have to say, my favorite is Alan Furman. No issues with them at all. Well regarded all over the DC area, and let me tell you, there is no shortage of picky folks in the DC area who would have driven them out of business ages ago. Gemnation in NY is another that's good to deal with.
One thing that generally makes me feel better with any GMS is that they have a brick and mortar showroom you can visit. Any outfit that does have proper office/retail space is going to be "on the up and up" and most likely thriving. The "we only do business over the WWW" folks are the one's I won't deal with. They don't have to have a lavish show room as one would find on Madison Ave, NY, but they need to have something that is customer friendly enough, something modest even like a non-street level office sort of thing would be fine, that receives walk in customers (i.e., no appointment) and has ample stock on display.
As for the GMSes out there and whether to use any of them, here're some thoughts from other watchies.
I have to say that while Alan Furman is my first choice among GMSes, sometimes they just don't have the watch I want. The thing is that more often than not over the years, I use the GMSes as bargaining levers in my negotiating with authorized dealers. This is especially the case when I'm buying a major name brand watch.
I mean after all, the only thing a GMS isn't going to give you, and that an authorized dealer (AD)will give you, is the manufacturer's warranty. If that bothers you, print a copy of the maker's warranty from their website and compare it with the one the GMS is offering. If you are satisfied that they are equivalent, buy the thing from the GMS. The reality is that no mainstream maker -- Tag, Hamilton, Rolex, etc. that sells their watches in a shopping mall is going to likely have a watch that goes haywire within the first two years, which is as long as nearly any warranty lasts. (Omega is now offering four years and I think Citizen has some for five years, but I can't see anything going wrong with them before the warranty expires either. It could happen, but I wouldn't expect it to.) I would be pretty worry free were I buying something with a purchased in movement inside too. ETA, Sellita, Miyota, F. Piguet,
et al have been making standard movements for ages and many watch repair guys know how to deal with them. Generally, a GMS will have just such a guy onsite if their customer's watch does need service. By contrast, were I buying a more esoteric movement -- say, Ressence's magnetic watch, or GP's constant escapement, or a Corum bridge movement, or anyone's grand complication watch, etc. -- I would probably be pretty keen to stick with an AD.
The one thing worth keeping in mind when buying form a GMS is that most of their watches are what is called "new, old stock" (NOS). What that means is that the watch is new (never sold to a consumer before), but it is also either out of production or it wasn't selling fast at a regular AD's store. What essentially happens is that the AD sells the watches to the GMS buyer and records the sales and maintains his selling quota/goals with regard to the manufacturer.
Lastly, I have seen some folks boo-hooing over AWS. I gotta tell you, a lot of it sounds bogus to me. If not totally bogus, it does sound as though the writer is leaving out some details. It sounds that way because (1) they aren't generally very detailed and specific about what exactly transpired and (2) they seem to always include a lot of irrelevant details, such as how much they spent on or what other watches they own, as if that information has any bearing on the actual facts of their transaction with AWS. I don't know about you, but if I'm going to listen to/read about someone's griping, I want just a complete and objective set of facts. I can draw my own conclusion. I don't need to be convinced by the passion of their outrage; the facts will speak for themselves.
Lastly, I see you are in Houston. Have you sought GMSes in your area? I'm assuming you've already checked Hal Martin's and they don't offer the watch you want? It's one of the few places from which I'd tell someone to buy a used watch. Like most major cities that have a lot of wealth flowing in, often enough, there's wealth that flows out too, along with the status seekers who probably shouldn't have spent that much on a watch to begin with, and those folks sell their watches and the high end pawn shop is the place to buy them. DC has a couple such places. I know L.A. has more than a couple, ditto NYC and Atlanta and most any other big city. Word to the wise though, even buying from a reputable pawn shop, know that buying used watches anywhere is something to do if one knows what one is doing.
All the best.