The kickstarter adventures of Sólás - solaswatches.com

Fitz II · 05-01-2021 5:04pm

Just remember who your real supporters are when you are ordering the drinks and canopies for the Solas delivery party in a swanky Dublin hotel.

I think the patek calibre 240 has been in production for 43 year so the US likely has the most microrotors

PPSA_TimeLine_Calibre_240_CMYK_HD.jpg?resize=1200%2C841&ssl=1

PPSA_TimeLine_Calibre_240_CMYK_HD.jpg?resize=1200%2C841&ssl=1

Thirdfox · 05-01-2021 6:30pm

Add in the Piagets and UG Polerouters and I suspect the US will be ahead yes - but with 69 (soon to be 70 I think) Ireland surely will have shot up the rankings

I'll get in touch with Mark Wahlberg and Conor to see if they're interested in something dressy too :pac:

redlead · 05-01-2021 9:30pm

Great to have attracted so many US investors which I think was your initial target group? How many of the 69 are Boardsies do you reckon?

Thirdfox · 05-01-2021 11:12pm

I would say there are a good 15-20 boardsies in that group of 70 there - it's hard to tell though as not all of yous make it known how you heard about the watch (or revealing what your username is

).

Though when I say boardsies I do mean the watch forum regulars - I'm sure some other boardsies saw the thread here/the charity drive with Alone etc. and decided to go in without necessarily knowing much about me at all or being a watch forum regular.

Yeah - it was primarily aimed at US (since they have a very large market for microbrand watches) - but since then I've seen that having an "as Gaeilge" watch brand can do some good work promoting Irish too - did a little bit of cross-promotion for them for the Starlight, but would certainly like to do more in the future.

Maybe the UK will improve in the future if I'll be taking VAT off for future model prices (VAT will be a headache for sure in the future as I do want to offer competitive EU prices but it'll be difficult once 21-23% needs to be added onto the Kickstarter/retail pledge amount/price).

Thirdfox · 06-01-2021 6:25pm

Interesting - got an email from GQ UK seeing if I would be interested in taking out an advertorial in the physical magazine. I do think the ABTW advertorial was very effective, the Worn and Wound news feature (not advertorial) was even more impactful but the Facebook campaign wasn't something I could measure in how it turned out.

I guess once I have physical stock after the pre-orders/KS finishes it will be worth potentially taking out these advertorials - but it's always nice to be contacted by a publication you have actually heard of (I was getting offers from random US cable tv networks which show the ads at 2am in the morning - a key microbrand demographic I'm sure :pac: )

Lorddrakul · 06-01-2021 6:45pm

Thirdfox wrote: »

Interesting - got an email from GQ UK seeing if I would be interested in taking out an advertorial in the physical magazine. I do think the ABTW advertorial was very effective, the Worn and Wound news feature (not advertorial) was even more impactful but the Facebook campaign wasn't something I could measure in how it turned out.

Not looking for the rate card, but was the offer anywhere within reality for you marketing budget wise?

Thirdfox · 06-01-2021 9:21pm

Lorddrakul wrote: »

Not looking for the rate card, but was the offer anywhere within reality for you marketing budget wise?

I'll need to get further details but their lowest rate (not sure how much coverage you get for that) is below ABTW and goes for hundreds (below 500 pounds anyway).

So definitely within reality (I spent multiples of that on Facebook ads) - it's always a question of which avenue has potential to gets the best returns (not just in sales - but raising publicity and awareness of the brand).

One of the worst I can promise you are many of the Instagram influencers who want a free watch to promote you on their instagram channel - apparently some of their followers are fake anyway so the rule of thumb is - "if you don't know of this influencer - it's probably not worth working with them"

This is it · 06-01-2021 9:58pm

Funny you mention Facebook. I do have an MVMT watch based on a mate recommending one when I hardly knew what a watch was

but generally speaking I wouldn't click to even look at a watch advertised on FB thinking that it's pretty much just MVMT type junk sold on it

Thirdfox · 07-01-2021 10:14pm

Interesting developments on the Equinox.

My partner factory came back after putting through all the design elements and… wow it's costly in terms of even the unit cost - the R&D costs once we go to prototyping was something I had prepared for but, unit cost is expected to be almost 5 times greater than the Starlight. I'm fine with continually making minimal returns just to bring out some interesting pieces but I'm not sure potential buyers will see it as such.

So...here is the initial discussion - if there was something to be given up between:
1. Tritium (only two places make it - so we have to use Swiss made microtec)
2. Custom hands (I suspect the cost is coming from the fact that we'll probably need to make 3000 or so hands and only use 500)
3. Tungsten case and bracelet - moving to 316L stainless would save a little bit but not as much as 1 or 2.

What would people choose to give up?

I think keeping the price under 600 euro (VAT inclusive) would be very important to keep things affordable (for US/UK buyers export price is 487 euro) - in one sense I'm confident the watch as currently configured/designed would be "better" than say a Zelos diver (I have to presume they are making greater profit margins on their 700-800 dollar watches) but using a Chinese movement (it'll be an upgraded HZ5000A) instead of their Swiss movements - that will be a hard sell I think. Especially as Sólás as a brand is nowhere as well known as Zelos, Halios or the other microbrands.

I think it would still offering great value for what the watch is and possesses - but very cognisant that anything above $500 usd often enters another level in buyers' minds.

Maybe it would be better to compromise on features and keep the price below 500 euro (vat inclusive)/500 usd (vat exclusive).

I'm sure that's a first price sent out from the factory supplier too - and we will have negotiations over price but for now - it would be good if people (who buy microbrand divers) give a view on what feature is least important to them:
1. Tritium vs luminova
2. Generic hands vs custom hands
3. Tungsten vs stainless steel case (the stainless would weight a lot less too and we would have access to more generic good quality bracelets vs needing to make a custom-made tungsten bracelet too).

^ with the above hopefully people get a glimpse of why microbrands tend to go with Rolex/Seiko/Omega homages - premade hands and cases are much cheaper to make and make well too (the factories may have these cases to hand) - new things always cost more - but that was the whole point of doing the Sólás projects

Any input appreciated!

Fitz II · 07-01-2021 10:56pm

The discount diver market is very competitive and buyers will have a lot of choice, I think pricing will be key as features that the owner which most likely never require, are fun to request on the internet, but not fun to pay for. Its very hard to give any opinion without seeing mockups or drawings...my feeling is that the diver automatic watch market is going to be very conservative.

Lorddrakul · 08-01-2021 10:41am

There seems to be a huge revival in the golden age of dive watches, from the mid to late sixties, as opposed to some of the more egregious sins of design in the early 70s.

Something a bit like this:

While this has meant smaller watches, 36-38mm, that just doesn't seem to translate these days, so 42 seems to be the sweet spot.

I'd say stainless is the way to go, unless you get a really sweet deal on a tungsten supply, but as you say, that comes with the need for different bracelets, etc.

I'd say look at the smaller brands from then, for design cues. However, for the technical details, I'd go for as modern as possible. So for lume, materials, movement, etc, I'd go for as modern and developed as possible, to be a differentiator. As has been pointed out, the auto diver market in the $500+ segment is highly competitive, offers a lot of value and a lot of choice. So, you'll have to have a compelling value proposition with USPs, as well as the great back story of Solás in general.

Just my tuppence, and probably nothing you haven't already accounted for.

Best of luck with it all, it may well be a tougher proposition than the Starlight.

fat bloke · 08-01-2021 10:52am

It's a pickle alright. There's so much choice out there and yet the buyers and msnufacturers can be inherently conservative, sure look at Rolex for God's sake.

Speaking as a customer - would I pay 500 quid for something "samey"? I dunno. Would I more inclined to go up to 600 quid for something genuinely different and stand-out in terms of specification? - Yeah, maybe. But I have to be honest, I have never spent over 350 on a watch so I don't actually know if, when push came to shove, I would actually shell out for it. - Impossible to be sure of course with no idea of what the end product might look like. But I definitely prefer the idea of pushing the boat out to differentiate Sólás from the crowd

banie01 · 08-01-2021 10:59am

1st off, after the success you have attained in bringing the Starlight to fruition.
Take time to pat yourself on the back.

I've seen a lot of the work you've put into the Equinox.
It is a great vision with lots to set it aside from the traditional diver.

If keeping the aesthetic you have in mind matters, I'd consider dropping tungsten.
It is a fairly unique case material but it's expensive, and very difficult to actually work with.
Both high melting temperature affects cost of casting and inherent toughness affecting machining.

Stainless offers (likely) large cost savings?
Its also far easier to work and as you have mentioned, offers access to a huge range of bracelet options.
Stainless could perhaps be made more unique for Sólás by using surface hardening or other finishing treatment?
Anodisation, PVD, Heat and quench and plenty other options to choose from?

On tritium, I'm with Fitz on this.
It's one of those features that when put on a wish list is a "must" have.
But one which when presented with actual costings, quickly can become a cost nightmare.
Good Lume is expensive, adding tritium to the list of requirements no doubt makes it even more so?

I like your plan for the lume colours, it's practical as well as attractive. How much difference to Equinox' function will be made by switching to a Superluminova rather than tritium based lume?
Is that difference in utility worth the increased overall cost?

Wibbs · 08-01-2021 11:00am

Lorddrakul wrote: »

There seems to be a huge revival in the golden age of dive watches, from the mid to late sixties, as opposed to some of the more egregious sins of design in the early 70s.

True L, but a lot of that is down to the vintage market, dealers and buyers running out of enough stock of the earlier and even the 70's stuff(the latter being pricey when new so fewer were sold in the first place). The mid sixties more "no big name" stuff was cheap when new and there were a lot more of them in circulation as nearly every brand, Swiss, French(especially French), German, Japanese jumped on the generic diver market and brought out more budget examples. The example you posted would be at least half the price of Omega, Rolex, Blancpain, Longines, Doxa divers of the time. So dealers hunting for stock have more of a supply going on which has driven the current trend.

IMHO anyway TF, of your list Tritium would be way ahead of any other lume and ahead of custom hands and case material(though tungsten could be a unique selling point in the segment?). If microtec tubes are used it also means they can be replaced in fifteen years time or whenever. Most wouldn't bother but do like the option(I've seen this debate regarding the Traser brand).

saccades · 08-01-2021 11:22am

Thirdfox wrote: »

So...here is the initial discussion - if there was something to be given up between:
1. Tritium (only two places make it - so we have to use Swiss made microtec)
2. Custom hands (I suspect the cost is coming from the fact that we'll probably need to make 3000 or so hands and only use 500)
3. Tungsten case and bracelet - moving to 316L stainless would save a little bit but not as much as 1 or 2.

What would people choose to give up?
I!

No interest in tritium at all, in fact I would see it as a downside, presume it'll be pre-installed on the dial like ball? Your looking at a watch that will be a beater and if a tube breaks the glass can get everywhere. Then who is going to fix it (dial/movement)?

Custom hands - how many hand types are there? I would be more concerned with the overall look rather than custom or not. On a side note, great hands that would fit Seiko movements would sell on eBay very well.

Tungsten - heavy, Shiney and massively scratch resistant. Ticks boxes for me. One watch that is a "dressy" diver (bit like the Seiko Stargate), could be a great single watch.

Fitz II · 08-01-2021 11:41am

Stupid question....you going display back on the diver Diyu? I am assuming not

Wibbs · 08-01-2021 11:44am

saccades wrote: »

Your looking at a watch that will be a beater and if a tube breaks the glass can get everywhere.

I've honestly never heard of a tritium tube breaking like that. They're very tough. They're also found in gunsights as well as watches and that's both exposed and prone to serious and repeated shocks. I've had a few US issued watches with trit tubes and they took a beating in my care.

wrist-watches-used-military-4.1-800x800.jpg

wrist-watches-used-military-4.1-800x800.jpg

I have one that's fecked, broke the crystal, snapped off the crown(don't ask

) but the tritium tubes were fine. They were extensively tested by the US government to survive pretty heavy duty impacts, magnetic fields, moisture/water resistance, drops in air pressure and passed.

Plus it's a far superior lume to even the best of the non radioactive stuff. I've personally found Seiko's stuff to be the best and yes initially is brighter than tritium, but after an hour or less the Tritium beats it and especially so in the brighter grade trit. Two hours in? No contest. Plus with tubes you can get them replaced down the line and it's back to bright as feck again.

hitemfrank · 08-01-2021 12:48pm

Tritium would be a definite for me personally. Having seen them in the Ball Marvelight I have, they are just so far ahead of lume.

The one thing I wish the Milguass had is tritium tubes.

Thirdfox · 08-01-2021 2:33pm

Lots of useful opinions provided - thanks everyone. I will be speaking to the partner today to see what can be done. For me - dropping the custom hands would be something that (if the savings are big enough) makes more sense than dropping tritium (and apparently the tungsten isn't adding much to unit cost once we have the moulds made).

As said from the beginning - I saw Sólás as a fun/useful way to push on watchmaking in the affordables/microbrand arena. Pushing things to €600 in a diver may not be keeping true to that goal - I'll have to see how to bring costs back down - the fancy stone/mineral dial options may be something that could be dropped - this would reduce overall height too (similar to the aventurine in the Starlight)

Fitz II wrote: »

Stupid question....you going display back on the diver Diyu? I am assuming not

There will be a display back actually - and the movement was to get a further upgrade (something similar to the salmon of knowledge edition's movement) - that golden movement was custom ordered for a different client of Hangzhou's but they can remake it for an increased fee.

If you search for Vostok amphibia display caseback you'll get an idea of how it will look like. With the Vostok caseback system it means thst you can easily swith to other casebacks too if people want a solid one instead.

The stone dials changing to enamel (paint) would make it much easier to offer different colours too.

Time to marry what is "ideal" to what is "possible"

- one thing I'm keenly aware of is that if there is a massive jump in price - a lot of people who liked the Starlight and Sólás may well be priced out of the Equinox - and that's not what I want either - it is about making something affordable and worthwhile having as a timepiece.

If it was purely a commercial venture - now would be the time to reuse the Starlight moulds and start making different dialled versions re-using existing equipment - instead, going with a new model is about trying to give a kick to the diver segment too to bring out new useful designs.

But - when you see Steinhart/Christopher Ward etc. in that same 600ish zone - while I think their designs may be "samey" or "safe" - they have got great reputations for quality and are using Swiss movements so... It would be a hard sell for a well decorated Chinese movement watch to compete with Swiss ones (in the minds of consumers) when at the 3-400 arena it was competing merely against the Japanese movements primarily.

Cyclingtourist · 08-01-2021 3:20pm

Thirdfox wrote: »

As said from the beginning - I saw Sólás as a fun/useful way to push on watchmaking in the affordables/microbrand arena. Pushing things to €600 in a diver may not be keeping true to that goal - I'll have to see how to bring costs back down - the fancy stone/mineral dial options may be something that could be dropped - this would reduce overall height too (similar to the aventurine in the Starlight)

My suggestion isn't about leaving something out it's about putting something Irish, or more specifically Irish-American, in.

How about some reference to Clare man John Phillip Holland who while in America developed submarines. Interesting story with connections to both the Royal Navy & American Navy as well as the Fenian Brotherhood.

Perhaps an image of the Holland VI submarine the 125th anniversary of whose launching will occur in 2022 on the case back.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Philip_Holland

Thirdfox · 08-01-2021 9:02pm

I was wondering what people had meant when they said the first submarine was invented by an Irishman (I had thought they were referring to the turtle used in the 1776 war) - Holland VI seems very cool too.

The Fenian aspect might be a little controversial - but hey he sold the plans to the Royal Navy too - would have said he was a good businessman but seems like from the Wiki he wasn't made rich from his invention.

I'll have a think - though right now with cost cutting being the priority adding any elements (say a swappable solid caseback with a Holland VI) may have to take a back seat...

Oh and difficult decision to make - but it seems that sadly tritium is gone - it unfortunately added hundreds onto production cost - a great feature - Wibbs in his post put it very well why I wanted a feature like that - but adding hundreds onto the cost isn't something I think people could understand/stomach. I imagine Ball gets a great discount for bulk orders from Microtec - but currently we can't afford that.

Idealism meets realism - I would have needed to strip almost all the design elements out to keep the tritium or switch to super luminova and keep my other design elements.

Cutting things out of a "perfect" design certainly hurts - but after our discussion we may have been able to almost half our unit cost. It was interesting - if we take out an extra edge from the bracelet we halved the cost of the bracelet.

Equally - it shows when people asks about "how come they couldn't add this little X Y Z finishing to an element" - it could be that the little bit of extra finishing adds another 100% of cost to the element - so balancing is needed to meet cost requirements.

I still hope to bring tritium to a future version of the Equinox - not this time when it adds hundreds onto unit cost though

Cyclingtourist · 08-01-2021 10:40pm

Thirdfox wrote: »

I was wondering what people had meant when they said the first submarine was invented by an Irishman (I had thought they were referring to the turtle used in the 1776 war) - Holland VI seems very cool too.

I said he developed the sub.
Claiming to have invented it is a bit like claiming to have invented the bicycle, depends how far back you want to go.

tweek84 · 17-01-2021 4:10pm

Thirdfox wrote: »

I would say there are a good 15-20 boardsies in that group of 70 there - it's hard to tell though as not all of yous make it known how you heard about the watch (or revealing what your username is ).

Though when I say boardsies I do mean the watch forum regulars - I'm sure some other boardsies saw the thread here/the charity drive with Alone etc. and decided to go in without necessarily knowing much about me at all or being a watch forum regular.

Yeah - it was primarily aimed at US (since they have a very large market for microbrand watches) - but since then I've seen that having an "as Gaeilge" watch brand can do some good work promoting Irish too - did a little bit of cross-promotion for them for the Starlight, but would certainly like to do more in the future.

Maybe the UK will improve in the future if I'll be taking VAT off for future model prices (VAT will be a headache for sure in the future as I do want to offer competitive EU prices but it'll be difficult once 21-23% needs to be added onto the Kickstarter/retail pledge amount/price).

Long time lurker on the progress of the Solàs project and have loved it from the start, I invested in the kickstarter last year and hopefully due to covid the timing of the watch arrival will be perfect
I'll give you the backstory, I was due to get married in may last year, my partner had promised me a watch as a gift and I had initially hoped that the watch would be ready in time but that did not pan out. We had decided on a tag heuer carrera calibre 5 (I know there is a difference between the tag and the Solàs but I think the Solàs will be more unique, Irish and I would probably keep it forever plus herselves family is from the gaelteacht, I am happy to take the hit on not having a calibre 5) but covid restrictions kicked in and my partner is on the frontline testing and dealing with the pandemic so we rescheduled our wedding until July 2021. Looking forward to more updates and love following the progress hopefully this year will be a more positive one with a lovely watch to add to to the collection.

Thirdfox · 17-01-2021 5:26pm

tweek84 wrote: »

Long time lurker on the progress of the Solàs project and have loved it from the start, I invested in the kickstarter last year and hopefully due to covid the timing of the watch arrival will be perfect
I'll give you the backstory, I was due to get married in may last year, my partner had promised me a watch as a gift and I had initially hoped that the watch would be ready in time but that did not pan out. We had decided on a tag heuer carrera calibre 5 (I know there is a difference between the tag and the Solàs but I think the Solàs will be more unique, Irish and I would probably keep it forever plus herselves family is from the gaelteacht, I am happy to take the hit on not having a calibre 5) but covid restrictions kicked in and my partner is on the frontline testing and dealing with the pandemic so we rescheduled our wedding until July 2021. Looking forward to more updates and love following the progress hopefully this year will be a more positive one with a lovely watch to add to to the collection.

That's fantastic to hear - and you'll be happy to hear you're not alone either - I've had so many messages from people who are backing the Starlight because of pretty special occasions - marriages, birth of children, significant birthdays, graduations - and just today someone got in touch to pre-order a Starlight in order to celebrate their completion of their PhD later this year.

Let me say that I am so absolutely elated that people are celebrating such significant events through the watch - it not only powers the passion to deliver the best watch I can but makes it really worth all the time, effort and work put into the brand and creating what I think are worthy timepieces. It's such a validation from people because they are using them to celebrate such important events.

A lot of trust has been invested in myself - and these stories are the ones I love to hear - it shows me that people have believed me when I said - "this watch will be special" - now it's up to me to live up to (and I hope to exceed) their expectations.

It's also why when my supplier has been asking if we can raise costs in order (for example) to get tritium into the 2nd model - I've been quite reluctant - it's not purely from a profit motive side - but I want Sólás to remain really accessible as much as possible and hey while independents like Ming etc. are fantastic (they are also full on businesses for their owners) - I don't actually necessarily want to be a Rolex or Patek - it's great to be able to provide *sólás* at levels that *most* people can afford.

And the interaction from the greater Sólás community has been great - someone mentioned to me launching a line of Starlight planetary models - for those who love Neptune's lapis lazuli look, or Saturn's tiger's eye or other exotic materials (not at Omega/Rolex price levels but still special for their buyers). That's something I'd definitely love to implement in the future - while trying to keep costs more than reasonable.

893bet · 28-01-2021 7:45pm

What’s the current ETA for starlight ?

Irishphotodesk · 28-01-2021 7:53pm

893bet wrote: »

What’s the current ETA for starlight ?

If my memory is right ... April/May

Thirdfox · 28-01-2021 8:21pm

Irishphotodesk wrote: »

If my memory is right ... April/May

That was the right date - but because of blued screws the date had been pushed to May/June.

I'm confident we should be on track for that. The movements won't be ready before Chinese New Year (feb 12th) and due to the 2 weeks holidays it's likely we'll get the movements to the assembler by mid-March - basically I hope to take receipt of the watches come start of May and begin attaching the straps/running last QC and so first watches should be sent out in May and finish by end of June.

That's the plan - and the blued screws/movement have eaten a little into my extraneous time allocation but I should still have some time for unforeseen circumstances.

It's also why I gave a realistic timeframe at the start (some people commented that it was much longer than others - but I just see it as delivering without delays... But of course need to still actually deliver it on time

)

Fitz II · 28-01-2021 10:02pm

Boards deliveries first I assume?

Thirdfox · 28-01-2021 10:50pm

To be honest I would be assuming that the boardsies and super early bird/early bird people will overlap quite a bit. I also wouldn't think that there would be much delay once I get started in having all 200+ watches inspected/regulated/assembled and packed for shipping.

If there are people who are in a rush to get one sent out (for marriages, events and whatnot I would priortise them first - be they a boardsie or otherwise) - but the difference between "first" and "last" should be a week or so - I'm not expecting it to drag out during that week/2 weeks of frenetic activity.

Fitz II · 28-01-2021 11:01pm

Thirdfox wrote: »

I also wouldn't think that there would be much delay once I get started in having all 200+ watches inspected/regulated/assembled and packed for shipping.

Sure what could go wrong

The kickstarter adventures of Sólás - solaswatches.com

Comments