Is Stowa gone Flat

Deep Thought

Given the amount of new and revised Steinharts new Military, the Ocean one Premium, new Ocean one Vintage and Vintage Red...

Have Stowa gone stagnant?

Thoughts...

Eoin

I think there's a difference between stagnation and knowing what your brand stands for and sticking to your strengths. I don't know if Steinhart know what niche they're trying to fill. Can they be more than a good quality homage brand?

Personally, if someone asks for a recommendation of a nice watch that looks like a Rolex sub for a good price, I'll recommend Steinhart every time. I think Stowa stands on its own 2 feet a bit more; it's just a really nice watch in its own right.

893bet

Eoin wrote: »

I think Stowa stands on its own 2 feet a bit more; it's just a really nice watch in its own right.

X 2

Was looking at their "sport" section and they have some really nice pieces there. Just a tad too expensive for my liking.

art

Eoin wrote: »

I think there's a difference between stagnation and knowing what your brand stands for and sticking to your strengths. I don't know if Steinhart know what niche they're trying to fill. Can they be more than a good quality homage brand?
.

Not sure that's fair comment these days, Steinhart make their own movement, do Stowa?
Stowa make nice conservative watches but their designs are the same classics that Steinhart refer to.
However, Steinhart have other options too, eg:

Eoin

As far as I know, Stowa do pretty cool stuff with some of their movements; I think they've customised an auto movement to make it hand-wound, or something like that. I don't know if Steinhart actually make their own movements. If they do, that's impressive, if more of a reaction to the ETA shortage than anything else.

But I never said that Steinhart don't try and do original designs, I just don't think they know really what their core proposition is. If they try and go upmarket, can they continue to make blatant homages as well, which is probably their bread & butter? Their quality is good, but it's generally in context of their prices. I've not handled their higher-end pieces, so I don't know if it's a step up or not.

I love Steinharts BTW - I've owned 3, and doubtless will own more - they're just not in the same league as Stowa for me.

Edit:
Just to clarify a little; I don't think Stowa really are innovators, but they know exactly what their niche is and they don't need to come out with loads of tweaks.

art

Well yes, I think Steinhart are making movement to address the ETA shortage issue, they've progressed from the original ST1 which was a heavily customised movement to the ST5 now that they claim as their own, though it is still essentially a clone by design. Anyhow, I don't want to seem like an evangelist for Steinhart, I wanted to buy their Marine Chronograph but the paltry water resistance put me off - seems daft to have a "marine" watch that you can't get wet! - so I do have some beef with Steinhart. But I also think their range has more designs that are not "homages" than that are, or are at least that are unique in some way, which is kind of the main point here: Stowa are still using designs that are almost entirely based on designs from 80 years ago, which as DT infers, can be hard to get particularly excited about (so over the course of a year, say, I will visit Steinhart site several times but practically never Stowa) but I guess you have a point too it's a niche they want to stay in and seems to be be serving them well so far.

Mredsnapper

http://forum.tz-uk.com/showthread.php?324979-Stowa-mechanical-digital


Food for thought