And unable to stop messing with the fundamentals that made its fortune in the first place. But OMEGA seems oblivious to the concept of overchoice. And I understand the need for a unique selling point to make a watch stand out from the competition. Has one-upmanship become reached the point where a collector’s happy to drop £7,410 and £9,990 on illegible watches? So now the owners of the Dark Side of the Moon Speedmaster Black Black can sport the same look in the swimming pool. This week, OMEGA revealed the Seamaster Diver 300M Co-Axial Master Chronometer Black Black – a watch that barely looks legible in the promotional shots. You could buy the standard chronograph and a Tudor Black Bay for the same money as the America’s Cup. These little additions will set you back an eye-watering £2,410 extra. It’s the same watch as the standard chronograph, with the same 9900 calibre, with a few gimmicky additions, such as locking the Chrono function, a regatta counter and the clip-on bracelet. A sailing watch with a clip-on and off bracelet? What could possibly go wrong? It’s fitted with the helium escape valve – a rather odd choice considering the watch is designed to be on the water, not under it. Take the America’s Cup model as an example. What annoys me the most isn’t the ridiculously large watch collections. Why on earth do you need nearly one hundred different varieties of the same watch? You have the choice of 99 different models. But wait! There’s more! The OMEGA Seamaster and Planet Ocean collections are dwarfed by the farrago that is the Aqua Terra collection. It’s not just the 300m range that suffers from bloating the Planet Ocean comes in 49 varieties. Regardless, the watch shows just how far from affordability the Seamaster Diver 300m has strayed. You’ve got to have a lot of spare cash and a strong penchant for watches and James Bond to drop £45K on an OMEGA. There’s also a platinum version for the princely sum of £44,480. There are now no fewer than eight different James Bond 007 OMEGA Seamaster Diver 300m’s: three limited editions, one numbered edition and four standard production models. OMEGA produced two different limited edition 007 watches to “celebrate” the last film. OMEGA has been churning out Jamesīond special editions with alarming regularity. By moderns standards, its 10,007 unit production run sounds extreme – but only in isolation. In 2002, OMEGA released its first 007 limited edition Seamaster 300m, coinciding with the 40th anniversary of the Bond films. The collection includes six different “special edition” versions.Įven James Bond hasn’t been able to avoid the bloating. You could wear a different OMEGA Seamaster Diver 300m every day for nearly two months. In its place: an obscenely bloated collection of fifty-three different versions of the 300m. Gone is that lean collection of six watches that blazed a trail through the industry. The OMEGA Seamaster is no longer a practical, purposeful watch for a fair price. Like a prized boxer whose best fights are behind him, the passage of time has not been kind to the 300m.
Since those heady days, the Seamaster Diver 300m lost its way. The OMEGA Seamaster Diver 300m was a genuine alternative: a no-nonsense watch with style and substance that didn’t require selling your firstborn to buy. The pricing parked the range squarely within reach of anyone considering TAG Heuer’s collections, and several hundred pounds below a Rolex Submariner. In the UK, the mid-size quartz model set buyers back around £700. The OMEGA Seamaster Diver 300m was reasonably affordable. (There was a chronograph version for those who didn’t want to take their Speedmaster swimming.) OMEGA sold the Diver in ladies, mid and gents sizes, with a choice of a quartz or COSC automatic movement. The slimline collection offered something for everyone.
Thanks to its rock solid bracelet and clasp – a far cry from the Rolex Submariner’s rattly bracelet and tin foil-feeling clasp – the OMEGA Seamaster Diver had genuine wrist presence. With its striking blue bezel, blue wave dial and helium escape valve, the OMEGA felt serious on the wrist. Back then, the OMEGA Seamaster Diver 300m was still very much the new kid on the block.
I started in the watch trade in the early 90’s.
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