Try one of the smaller, off the beaten track watch repair shops. They often have some really elegant, 50-60 year old watches that look great and still work fine.

Is the market bombing on watches as the economy tumbles? After asking a similar question here a month or 2 ago I settled on a new Rolex submariner date stainless steel, black dial. I’d been told by collectors the wait list was 1 to 3 years, so with 17 months before my 40th I walked oxford st and bond st last week to check the exact price and place the order.4 dealers told me the wait is now 4 weeks….2 had a watch in store I could have bought right then. Things seem to be changing.

Oh and OP go to a decent dealer (mappin and webb were nice to me), see some watches in the flesh and on your wrist. I have very slim wrists so lots of modern watches are way to large, others are stupidly thick and others look odd in the flesh….go see

Is there a product that is more reliant on branding/nonsense/HQ invisible internals than luxury watches?

I took my 60 yr old Rolex to a shop called The Jewellery Centre in Vyse St Birmingham with a broken mainspring. They sourced a non-rolex equivalent and gave it a full service (curing an irritating rattle in the auto-winder too) for about £150 in total. It’s now running perfectly. Worth a trip.

I’m sure that there is a chinese factory churning out authentic aged looking ‘vintage’ watches to be fed into the market.

Russell Talerman in London does reasonably priced repairs and restorations. I have used him and would recommend.

My experience of Tag Heuer’s customer service has been pretty bad. I wouldn’t touch another, but I guess that won’t be a consideration if you’re buying vintage.

+ for Timefactors

I have a PRS18 which seems to have appreciated in value in the short term I have owned it.

Quality is fantastic often better than big name brands costing several hundred pounds more.