Watches: how the Seventies changed the game

You don’t have to remember the Seventies to know they were rubbish. The decade was one long avocado-bathroomed nightmare with nothing to look forward to but power cuts and Morris Marinas. But it is also the decade that gave us Rocky, David Bowie and the Lamborghini Countach. Can it really have been so bad?

For the watch industry the answer is easy. Yes, it was very bad. Watch companies faced a very real threat to their very existence. Switzerland was the centre of the watchmaking world, but by the beginning of the Seventies it was clear that quartz from the Far East was going to do the business of timekeeping far more efficiently than clockwork lovingly but expensively fettled by Swiss craftsfolk.

The gold standard of accuracy had always been the Swiss watch. But who would pay more for a Swiss watch when a cheaper one from Japan told the time better? The logical answer was nobody. And the very logical Swiss saw this as a sign that the game was up. 

There weren’t kidding themselves. Sales really did plummet during the Seventies. There was a fightback, but this didn’t get going until well into the Eighties, when a management consultant by the name of Nicolas George Hayek masterminded a plan to launch the affordable Swatch brand, creating a new sector and using the capital to ensure the survival of key fine watch brands like Omega and Longines. 

But as individual brands fought for survival, the crisis brought out the best in them. Some of the oldest brands were too traditional for their own good, but suddenly when they thought the game may be up, they started getting creative. Patek Philippe and Audemars Piguet, for example, both started making steel sports watches that cost more than a gold Rolex. Absolute madness. 

When the industry emerged from the crisis, there was no going back. Before the Seventies you bought a nice watch because it was the best way to tell the time. Afterwards you bought one just because you felt like it. So the watch industry you see today, with countless shapes, colours, sizes and styles, has its origins in the Seventies. It was a decade of change, and judging by the number of Seventies-themed watches around at the moment, the watch industry is finally giving the decade its dues.