Will Cheap Replica Rolex Watches UK Ever Not Be Number 1?

Switzerland is a monarchy. This might be news to you, but from a watchmaking perspective, the neutral Alp country is not a democracy run by many. Replica watches UK brand that rules them all. And its reign, which dates back many decades, doesn’t show any signs of weakness. On the contrary, sales revenue numbers show that Rolex is becoming mightier and mightier. And that knowledge produced a provoking question: will Rolex ever be not number 1? This Fratello thought experiment will question the seemingly ironclad laws of watchmaking. What would it take to bring down the mighty “Crown”? Is always being in first place taking its toll on Rolex?

Let’s not mess around: the answer to that question is a straightforward “no.” A constant stream of relevant new perfect copy Rolex watches has sales booming. And with 2023 watches like the latest iteration of the GMT-Master II with its black and gray ceramic bezel or the revamped Daytona, why would sales go down? The clear-cut answer “no” is supported by the 2022 Morgan Stanley Swiss Watch Industry Report. The report shows that Rolex soars high above the competition when it comes to sales revenue. Let’s take a closer look.

Last year, Rolex generated approximately US$9.7 billion in sales revenue. The brand is leading the competition by a mile. The other two brands on the unofficial podium are Cartier in second place with an estimated US$3 billion in sales and Omega, just behind, with approximately US$2.7 billion. More numbers will make even clearer just how exceptional Rolex is. In 2022, Swiss watch exports soared to a record US$27 billion, and Rolex’s part in that all-time high is 29.2 percent. That’s up 1.5 percent from the year before, a year that broke the 2014 Swiss watch exports record.

For Rolex to drop to second place, the two closest competitors right now need to do more than three times better, and Rolex needs to stop growing. “If you put on a crown, somebody will try to take your head,” novelist Lazlo Ferran once wrote, but the “Crown’s” adversaries are so much smaller, they can’t even reach the head. But will the undisputed number 1 of Swiss watchmaking ever slide down the rankings and become significantly smaller? What would it take for the “Crown” to topple?

Bad products can ruin a brand. But is Rolex even capable of making bad products? Well, the last Cellini collection that got axed and replaced by the Perpetual 1908 was hardly an overwhelming success. Also, controversial novelties like the 2022 “Lefty” GMT-Master II and the 2023 Day-Date “Emoji” were greeted with skepticism, caused quite a stir, and provoked heated debates. Brand experts believe that no brand is strong enough to carry a product that doesn’t embody its core attributes. Well, in the case of the Lefty and the Emoji, it shows the experimental and playful DNA of Rolex. It also shows that being in first place all the time doesn’t necessarily mean you become uninspired and predictable.

Going out of style also doesn’t seem to be a thing that could happen to Rolex. Yes, there’s an overload of replica Rolex watches for sale on Instagram, for instance, and they’re not always worn by the most inspirational people or for the “right” reasons. The fact that Rolex watches are now traded and treated like commodities doesn’t sit well with watch purists, but that group is not the motor behind the brand’s steady rise. It’s people who think “Rolex” when they think “Swiss luxury watch,” “status,” “symbol of success,” etcetera, etcetera.

In the new production facility, Rolex will continue to do what it does best — doing things the Rolex way. To me, it seems like that way is looking forward, staying focused on your values, and not allowing yourself to be distracted by other brands — brands you can’t even see in the rearview mirror — and the whims of the people. The late Dominique Tadion, who worked for more than 20 years at Rolex in the communication department, once told me during Baselworld that Rolex could sell way more diamond high quality fake Rolex watches than it made, but it wouldn’t do so because all that bling would negatively impact the brand.

If Rolex decided to stop producing icons like the Submariner, GMT-Master II, Day-Date, and Daytona — there’s never enough of them to go around anyway — to put perfect fake Rolex watches like the Perpetual 1908 in the spotlight, it would be a terrible move. But I believe that it could only turn truly disastrous if all the Rolex Testimonees (its ambassadors/spokespeople) get canceled simultaneously because of outrageously scandalous behavior — think Micheal Bublé admitting to lip-syncing his whole career — and the world plummets into an unprecedented recession at the same time. It will take a perfect storm to bring down the Crown. So even if the forecast for the next few years is less sunny than the last two, the sunlight will shine on Rolex, making it look as untouchable as ever.