Quaid Walker of Bezel on the AP x Swatch collab: an automatic Royal Oak for ~$400 launches May 16

Speaker 5: So Well,

Speaker 6: thank you guys. It's it's an honor to be here. Thanks for

Speaker 1: having me.

Speaker 2: Great to see Have

Speaker 5: a great day. Cheers.

Speaker 1: We'll talk to you later.

Speaker 5: You too. Bye, guys.

Speaker 1: Goodbye. Up next, we have Quaid from Bezl. You know him. You love him. He was one of the first TBPN sponsors. Good friend of ours. And here he is to break down the big news. How are you doing, Quaid?

Speaker 12: Hey, guys. How are doing?

Speaker 5: What's happening?

Speaker 1: Wait. Okay. Quick question. Are you do you have the same name as your father, grandfather and great grandfather?

Speaker 12: Do I have the same name?

Speaker 1: No. The same first name? No. Because some Quaids are the fourth. So oftentimes if you're if you have the same name as your father, you'll be known as Junior. And then if you have the same name as your father and your grandfather, you'll be known as a Trip. So if you ever meet somebody who's like, oh, my name's Trip, sometimes their name might be like John the third. And some Quaids apparently are the fourth John. Like I'm John the fourth but I go by Quaid. Anyway, that was a dumb question. Tell us about AP.

Speaker 12: Yeah. It's it's an interesting week right now. Obviously, I think everyone in in the watch world or the watch world adjacent has heard about the the collab with Swatch and everyone sitting around speculating and using AI to render examples of what they think it's going to be. And so we're all sitting and waiting until I believe the sixteenth to learn what the deal is.

Speaker 5: Yeah. So so what is your prediction right now? Do you think it's gonna be a plastic Royal Oak? Do you think it there's a wild card scenario where it's something entirely different?

Speaker 1: Wait. So so so we watched a reveal video that would look like CGI of some gears coming together. But I guess that video didn't actually show us what the design is. Correct? So all of the all of the colored royal oaks that I'm seeing that look like they're plastic, that's fake in AI. Is that right?

Speaker 12: Exactly. So I I think truths that we have are they use the Royal Oak font Okay. And like so indicating that it's like it's going to be something derivative of a Royal Oak.

Speaker 1: Okay.

Speaker 12: There's been the Swatch Pop Yeah. Which is referenced in Swatch Pop historically as a model that is both a watch, but could also be popped into a lanyard of sorts. So and then you saw a rendering from Swatch of a lanyard, like a little clip of some colored lanyard. So I think that's, like, indicating that that's the direction they're moving. And then you saw some of the packaging in the boxes, and then you saw the system 51 movement. And so what that indicates is just that it's going to be an automatic movement. The system 51 movement is Swatch's movement. It's what's in the Blancpawn collaboration. And the cool part about the movement is that it's it's theoretically like a fully disposable movement in the sense that it's it's completely three d rendered and three d printed. And so, like, they don't do repairs on it, for example. Like, they just it's, more efficient for them to replace the entire movement.

Speaker 1: Okay.

Speaker 12: So it's a mechanical movement, ninety ninety hour power reserve. Like, it has some impressive stats. Yeah. But it's like pretty much Swatch's movement. And so what it looks like happening is there's gonna be some flavor of a Royal Oak in some watch slash lanyard device with an automatic movement. It's kind of all we know today. And then there's a there's several color ways that are starting to come out.

Speaker 8: Got it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 1: Can you quickly reset on the terminology? Because you just said, you know, movement automatic. Is there a battery? Is it quartz? Like like, do do do a little bit terminology for everyone.

Speaker 12: Yeah. So quartz would mean, like, it has a battery that runs an automatic movement. It would mean, it's a set of gears that are powering the watch. Okay. Typically, like, in high horology these

Speaker 1: days,

Speaker 12: an automatic movement is indicative of, like, a, you know, a traditional wristwatch the way that you would think about it. There are a few quartz watches that trade really well in the secondary market like a, you know, Jor and Elagance, for example. But largely, like, people are out here lusting for the automatic movements.

Speaker 1: Automatic movements.

Speaker 12: That's why it's interesting. They did that with the collab with Blancpain. They went with the automatic movement. Yeah. And it's like moving a bit up market in that sense. And so they're they're they're in that snapshot, they're basically saying like we're doing the same thing here.

Speaker 1: Yep. Were talking about cost. People have been speculating 300 to 15 to $500. And we were sort of going back and forth on like, if it is an automatic movement, even if it's three d printed, it seems like that's not a dollar. Like do you have any sort of benchmark for like what something like this would even cost the two companies to make? Obviously the margins are great across all specters of the watch economy. Yeah.

Speaker 5: Cost and then price estimate. And we're gonna come back to this on Monday. So you better be you better nail it.

Speaker 12: Yeah. I'm certainly not the guy to give you the breakdown there, but I will say if you look at this the Moonswatch launch, I think it was the $285 retail. That's a quartz example. Yeah. Blancpain, I think they launched that in the April. Okay. And that's directly the same movement that would be powering this. So I think the speculation is somewhere in the 4 hundreds. The only interesting, like, morsel here that's that's nuanced is, obviously, the two high horology brands they they collabed with previously are, like, part of the Swatch Group.

Speaker 1: Oh, yeah.

Speaker 12: And this is the only one that's external to the Swatch Group. Obviously, like, AP is in a bit of a different level from a, like, a Rarefied Air perspective.

Speaker 5: So I don't

Speaker 12: know how much, like, using that brand factors into the profit sharing. Mhmm. But it's super interesting. I don't know. It's like, I think a lot of people are torn

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 12: Because in many ways, it's a fun accessible moment to engage with a brand that's otherwise like the, you know, you know, to get a base model Royal Oak today, think is like 30,000 at retail and and certainly more in the secondary market.

Speaker 5: Yeah. To me to me, it's it's strategic because they're they are dealing with fakes. There's no desirable the fake there's a fake problem and then there's the fact that there's not a super desirable AP in my view under $30. Right? Because nobody that's like, I don't know any I don't know any like, you know, I don't have any friends that are like, oh, I'm just really saving up for a code 1159 like I gotta have it. Whereas I do know a lot of people that are like very excited that, you know, to

Speaker 1: Also like with

Speaker 5: like get an AP at some

Speaker 1: point With Patek, like some people are like, yeah, I'll start with a dress watch of Calatrava. Like, I'm not that upset about that because it has a lineage, it has a story and it's probably three to five x cheaper than a Nautilus. If it gets me on that track, I'm okay. But AP hasn't had that. Sorry. What else?

Speaker 5: Yeah. So so to me, I don't by doing this, they're in in in some ways, like, I feel like counteracting the flood of fakes because a lot of people out there that'd be like, well, I'll I you know, I'm not gonna get the Royal Oak yet, but I'll get I'll get one of these AP Swatches if it does end up being a wristwatch, and I think I think that could be cool, and it and it provides an entry point into the brand. I don't think there's people out there that are like, well, was gonna get, you know, a stainless steel Royal Oak, but now I'm just gonna get the the Swatch Right? Like it doesn't I don't think it cannibalizes them at all. In fact, like a lot of people that already have a Royal Oak, a real one will be like, well, I'll get one of these to wear to the beach because like I maybe would would have worn a G Shock or something like that. So I think it's pretty smart. But But what do you think, Wade? That said,

Speaker 4: I text

Speaker 5: you this morning

Speaker 1: and say It's over.

Speaker 4: Let's I

Speaker 3: think it

Speaker 12: comes down to how much, you know, it devalues the ownership of the $30,000 plus Royal Oak. Right? I think, like, the the pro side argument is that, to your point, Jordy, it's an interesting entry point. It allows people to kind of aspirationally engage with the product before they can buy the product. I think the con is if you see a bunch of people wearing a $400 example of the watch that you spent $30,000 for it, is it in some way detract from the ownership that you have? There's a lot of these arguments in the Internet of like, you don't see Ferrari out here collaborating with Toyota to make a candidate. There's a lot of those commentaries.

Speaker 5: Yeah. But another another I I guess I can something I go to is like if a Porsche owner pulls up to grab a coffee on a Sunday morning in a GT three RS and they see someone with a Carrera T, they're not sitting there like, oh, that Carrera T is devaluing my g g three r s. They're thinking Mogged.

Speaker 12: That's the that's the equivalent of, like, you know, someone pulling up with, you know, an open work ceramic

Speaker 9: Yeah.

Speaker 12: Royal Oak, and then someone's walking in with a fifteen four fifty thirty seven millimeter starter Royal Oak. Right? Like, I think you're still in that same realm.

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 12: This would be like, you know, if you show up in your, you know, GT three Touring and someone else pulls up with the Toyota collab that

Speaker 6: you know With a

Speaker 5: badge? No. Just a Camry with a badge.

Speaker 1: The badge. Yeah. With the badge.

Speaker 2: Yeah. Exactly.

Speaker 1: Yeah. So I don't why in

Speaker 5: the chat says they should. Toyota makes a good car. I agree.

Speaker 1: I agree. I Okay.

Speaker 5: Porsche badge. I want the Porsche badge BYD.

Speaker 1: Yeah. No. The real the the real move is down badging. Get the Carrera GT, throw the Boxster on the back. See if anyone anyone notices. Are you noticing any movement on bezel yet? Any early signs of weakness in the traditional AP or Royal Oak Market or just an increase in listings even?

Speaker 12: It's an interesting time because I I haven't seen a response to this yet other than, like, a lot of people asking us questions. And a lot of people, like, want access to that. Think the same thing happened when the Moon Swatch came out. Like Mhmm. We had everything from, like, you know, professional athletes to regular people asking for, like, big boxes of these Moon Swatches, and we don't traditionally sell them.

Speaker 1: Oh,

Speaker 12: sure. We did some interesting concierge stuff there. It was interesting time, though, where I think there's a funny thing happening in the Royal Oak market, right, generally right now where there's a lot of, like, really cool discontinued examples that are available that are trending kind of at retail or less than retail. And so, you know, if you look back on the rocks on the Royal Oak catalog, there's, you know, you can get a fifteen three hundred. It's a 39 millimeter, oftentimes, arguably better size for in the low thirties right about where retail is. You can get a $15,415 500 and, you know, and now you're at the fifteen five ten. Like, those examples trade above retail. There's a lot of them that are trading at retail over time. And, like, synthetically, they're kind of you know, you're getting a Royal Oak out of that offer. And so we're seeing a lot of people buy Royal Oaks and getting great deals on them right now in market. And so it'll be really interesting to see if this release, like, generally just elevates all Royal Oaks and it's just hype in the market and everyone wants them. Or if it does the inverse where you start to realize, like, oh, maybe I don't need to wait on this wait list for this thing that I'm lousing for. I'll buy this watch, and now it opens my mind to, like, you know, maybe I'll buy the older example for $28,000 versus waiting for the new one for, you know, 33 or whatever that is.

Speaker 1: Mhmm. Well, what else is new in the watch world? What's the next event on the calendar that everyone's has their eyes towards?

Speaker 12: I think the next big one is Geneva Watch Days is in is in September. So that's a big fun one. But I think everyone's still reeling from watches and wonders. Yeah. That that still happened quite

Speaker 5: recently. Who won?

Speaker 1: Oh, yeah.

Speaker 12: I don't know if anyone won. I think there's a lot of great examples. The The

Speaker 5: salmon the salmon ultra That's overseas.

Speaker 1: Yeah.

Speaker 12: I would say big fan of the overseas in salmon. I'm a I'm a good sucker for a salmon dial, big fan of the kind of 38 millimeter Nautilus. Mhmm. But I think there's been sneaky winners. Like, I I think the UN super freak was incredible and, like, being there in person and checking all of out was really awesome. Lot of cool releases and it was super fun being there. So, you know, just another nothing like, wow. I didn't expect this, but just a lot of, like, really great stuff that makes me excited to buy and sell watches.

Speaker 5: Fantastic. Amazing. Well, thank you

Speaker 1: so much for coming on

Speaker 9: the show.

Speaker 5: You for the for the intel. Always a good time. Excited to see the launch. Are you gonna be camping out at the any Swatch stores this weekend or you got better things to do?

Speaker 12: I I will not be doing that unfortunately, but I look forward to to getting the coverage of it and and see. I'm sure we'll I'm sure we'll be placing some examples into some clients' hands as soon as it it pops up. It'll it'll probably be very desirable in the very beginning for sure.

Speaker 1: Fantastic. Well, thank you so much. Have a great week. You, Craig. We'll talk to you soon.

Speaker 12: Awesome. Thanks, guys.

Speaker 1: Goodbye. We can pull up this post from simplifying stocks. We got another chart, maybe a chart crime. We'll decide. We'll put Tyler on the case. People are constantly trying to map this boom to the .com boom. Does it look exactly like it? Simplifying stocks certainly seems like it does match up perfectly. It feels like 1999. Yes, it does. They took the 2026 stock market overlaid it. It looks perfect. It looks like we're due for a crazy, crazy breakout. What will happen? I don't think anybody knows, but we'll let you decide. If you benchmark and fit the graph and change the y axis and the x axis perfectly, you got the perfect pattern. The chartologists and the chatter going wild. Anyway, we'll have

Speaker 5: to dig We're gonna find out

Speaker 7: We're gonna find

Speaker 5: where we are exactly

Speaker 1: From here, I do I do think time. I I I would predict that the market's either gonna go up or down over the next couple years. Like like one of those two outcomes for sure.

Speaker 5: I think a 50% chance.

Speaker 1: Fifty fifty up?

Speaker 5: It goes up.

Speaker 1: 50 up, 50 down.

Speaker 5: I don't wanna be too, you know You know I don't wanna Historically,

Speaker 1: it's gone up more than it's gone down. So you should actually be like 51% up or 52% up if you want to be, you know, historically accurate. Anyway, thank you for tuning in. Have a great day. Leave us five stars in Apple Podcast and Spotify. Sign up for our newsletter, tbpn.com. Goodbye.