Hi this is mark from Long Island watch calm and welcome to another episode of watch and learn today we’re going to be tackling Swiss made what does the term that you see on a watch dial or a case Swiss made what does that term mean and it’s actually not a very simple answer
You could probably speak at length about the topic probably a couple of hours even the document describing it is several pages long so I’m gonna go over you know what it means the boat the basic bullet points of what it means and a little bit of I guess why
It is a point of contention with people in the industry and why consumers I guess just can get confused by it so for the occasion I’ll wear two Swiss watches undeniably Swiss the Rolex it says Swiss made at the six I’m gonna pick that up and the Breitling which oddly enough
Does not say Swiss anywhere on the dial but on the case back it is written Swiss made in another language so what does Swiss made mean so the first thing that you have to understand and again I’m I’m from the US I’m in the US so laws may be different in your
Country but in the US and many of the larger industrialized nations the Swiss made is actually a registered u.s. trademark so if you go to USPTO which is the website for the United States Patent and Trademark Office and you do a a mark search or a word search for Swiss made
You will see it’s Swiss made is owned by what is known as the FH which is the Swiss watch Federation I guess the actual translation is the the Federation of the Swiss watch industry they actually own that trademark so if you’re a company that’s putting Swiss made on a
Watch and it’s not actually Swiss made you know besides you know all the bad stuff that comes with you know counterfeit products you can actually be sued for trademark infringement and I think that can obviously be a very costly bill so it is a trademarked term and then any variations thereof anything
That kind of will mean Swiss made is a trademark so to trademark in the USA so even though it’s a swiss company it is a trademark that we have here so in the past you know when companies I guess were really Swiss there wasn’t much of a need to define the basic requirements
The requirements were Swiss made have been around for decades but in the past you know say a company like Rolex like Breitling or any of your other you know long history companies really did make almost everything in Switzerland they put Swiss meet on the dial not a problem
But then over the years you know you had to you know I guess more legalities came into effect and you had to define what does what does Swiss made really mean and then a set of standards was introduced and people being you know capitalists er you know some companies
Just want to do the absolute bare minimum to get that mark cuz Swiss made to most customers Swiss made mean something maybe to the super educated watch consumer you might know that Swiss made is not the most important thing written on a watch there are Japanese watches that again in my opinion sorry
Blow Swiss watches away and then there’s some Swiss watch does that blow everything out of the water but you know there are countries that are very good with her ology and they’re not in Switzerland or accusing they are not Switzerland so these rules were developed and companies that were
Starting to make watches were just following the guidelines and they were basically doing exactly what was required to get that mark of Swiss made so if it said you had to walk a half a kilometer they walk half a kilometre they then walk half a kilometer plus a
Foot they meet the requirement exactly and of course being a document you can you know that Swiss made requirements as a document you could weasel your way around it you do things differently and you can still you know get that Swiss made mark and that I guess gets a lot of
The watch industry that says for the higher end watch industry got in a tussle because you know so say your role that’s not saying the rowlocks is one of the companies but say your Rolex and you are almost totally Swiss made well you walk totally suppose made right everything’s made in Switzerland they
Almost make everything themselves so here you are doing it you’re doing a great job and along comes XYZ company and they make parts in various parts of the world and they just meet the bare requirements the bare minimums they bring into Switzerland they put it together and then they get to share the
Same mark that you do that that Swiss made mark of elegance and I think that’s where a lot of the contention comes you know you’re just skirting by and you kind of mean the same you know someone re scored an A and now you’re coming by and you’re answering just enough
Questions to get the same exact rate and I think that that you know rightfully so you know you’re kind of stepping on people’s toes and doing less working and getting the same grade so the way the FH gets around at the Swiss watch fitter rate Federation and that really gets
Around the way they explain it is they are setting a minimum degree of I hate this term swiftness reminds me of Swiss Miss hot cocoa they’re setting a amount of swiftness that needs to be in a watch in order to get the Swiss made mark and the document is a living breathing
Document it gets revised there was a revision that went into effect in January of 2017 there’s another revision that will take place in another one or two years to further hammer down what it takes to be a Swiss made watch and to earn that Swiss made label so before
I’ll get to the four points in a second and then I’ll have some discussion afterwards but before I get to the the four points you know Swiss made doesn’t mean the same thing as made in the USA doesn’t mean the same thing as made in Germany doesn’t mean the same thing as
Made in Japan the Swiss have spelled it out in the USA the FTC has basically said if you want to say you’re made in the USA virtually everything has to be you know sourced and made in the United States of America you know that there’s a very big watch company in Detroit that
Recently got their hand slapped because they said they were made in the USA and it turns out they were warming so they had to kind of change their slogan around so the FTC takes it very seriously made in the USA really almost means made in the USA
Whereas Swiss made there’s a little bit of weaseling so let’s go over those four points and then we’ll have some post discussion so here’s the document you can print it out go to the FHS website of the FHS twist or something web site they have the whole document you know
They kind of just give a little bit of summary in in the front but you dig down you can get the full document it’s not an official document because the official document is only available in French or German so this is the English translation but it goes
Through the whole thing it defines what a watch is and then it goes through all the requirements you must meet and then all the marketing requirements it’s very well written it’s written you know like a specification you know if you remember the dive watch episode I did on ISO
Specifications it’s similar so there’s four things you have to do to be a Swiss made watch the first is the movement has to be Swiss that’s a whole nother ballgame there’s two or three pages of this document dedicated to what a Swiss movement means because now people will
You know have have a movement have all the parts it created another country bring them in Switzerland and put them together and voila Swiss movement well no it doesn’t really work like that they’ve really defined what a Swiss movement means so but for us a Swiss movement you know there’s not many
Watches that the affordable customer is gonna purchase that have an in-house Swiss movement so obviously a company like Etta the Swiss made a movement Solita Swiss made movement there’s not many others out there that vie for the Swiss made label that you know we have to worry about our concern ourselves
With but they’ve to find it it’s all there on what a Swiss movement has to be so number one movement must be Swiss number two the movement must be cased in Switzerland so you must take the movement with the dial and hands on it obviously and put it into the case of
The watch that’s your second criterion number three final inspection of the entire timepiece must take place in Switzerland so you can’t do qa/qc in Italy or in Japan or in China and then bring it into Switzerland and sell it through their market is Swiss made no
Final QA must be done in Switzerland and then the fourth this item was added I’m pretty sure I believe in 2017 I think this is the Edition I they actually increased the percentage of the watch that has to be made in Switzerland so now I’ll read it verbatim at least 60%
Of the manufacturing costs of the watch are generated in Switzerland so now you’re not just half you’re more than half of the watch has to be made in Switzerland from a financial point of view you know labor material etc so those are the four points movement Swiss cased in Switzerland final inspection in
Switzerland and then 60% of the value generated in Switzerland there is another change coming into force in a year or two and that is gonna be the fifth bullet and I’ll read it again verbatim its technical development has taken place in Switzerland in the case of exclusive mechanical watches always
The mechanical construction and prototyping of the watch as a whole and then it goes into not exclusively mechanical watches which really not interested in we’re talking about Swiss made the mechanical watches sorry sorry to have a timer actually sorry aerospace so basically now you’re a company and
You want to make a watch well you have to spend your R&D dollars in Switzerland you can prototype it you know somewhere else everything up get it ready to go and then move into Lucerne and start making watch that doesn’t work you have to now be creating the watch prototyping
It and doing all that work but we call it the NRI the non recurring expenses have to be done in Switzerland so now that you’ve got all those pieces together how do you you know what you mark to watch well if you meet all those criteria and you can mark it as Swiss
Made Swiss made in Switzerland any variation thereof is acceptable and ditto if you want to if you’re being unscrupulous and you don’t meet the requirements you can’t say the Swiss made say made Swiss or anything you can’t play with the word is there anything that the the tone of the
Meaning is It’s Made in Switzerland you’re out I even go so far as to say that if the watch let’s say you have an edit based watch so you know watch was an end of twenty twenty four but the entire watch comes from another country I
You cannot say Swiss on the dial you have to say Swiss movement and it says in the spec that movements must be spelled out not MOV T I’m not I’m not too sure about that but it has it says you must say Swiss movement I thought that was interesting and then where do
You mark it well you can mark it anywhere exterior on watch on the dial on the case it goes through all the requirements for that where the case must have been made you know if you’re gonna mark it as Swiss then the case must have been Swit and
What does it mean to have the case being Swiss it explains all of that so my Breitling has the Swiss made on the case back which means yes the case is made in Switzerland or it meets the criterion for being made in Switzerland so marking extremely covered you know
Swiss made Swiss what is what is the Swiss movement even goes so far as to say that and I thought this was interesting and they they I say they thought of everything but I obviously have him because people still try to skirt around as best they can if let’s
Say the dial you make the dial in Switzerland you make the whole entire watch else because think about it you know a lot of these cases of cases all the components are manufactured separately and then it’s put together so you need to know the final product is
Going to hopefully be a Swiss made watch so if you make the dial in Switzerland but it is not destined for a Swiss made watch you must put Swiss on the back of the dial and the part that touches the movement so no putt you can see it I
Don’t want the case it’s got to be on the inside so that you know it’s not visible externally so it can’t be confused with a Swiss made watch they’re just getting more and more refined on what the Swiss made means and like right now the next revision takes place in
2019 or so and it’s gonna continue on and I’m sure they’re gonna raise that 60% number to a higher number that you know eventually obviously there’ll be people will fall out and maybe a new label will will come to the market who the heck knows I have no idea so those
Are the four things currently that you need to follow to have a Swiss made watch the fifth item is coming in a couple of years as I mentioned and I’m sure more will be added over the years so I hope that clears things up for you
On what Swiss maid means god this has been marked from long island watch calm with watch and learn please like this video if you enjoyed it please subscribe to the channel if you have not done so yet if you have any questions or comments or feedback and I’m sure there
Will be a lot of feedback on this one I’m guessing there will be I hope there is put it down below in the comments and I’ll be sure to get to it as soon as I can thanks for watching bye bye
