The Watch Guy Christian Danneman’s consumer satisfaction survey focusing on watch servicing generated more than 700 responses and even prompted a meeting with Swatch Group.
Danneman, who is the owner of independent watch service centre The Watch Guy which posts detailed photographic blogs of the servicing and repairs it carries out online, posted his grievances with Swatch Group’s decision to cease the supply of spare parts to independent watch service centres in a post on his website and launched the survey to better understand how his customers feel about the matter.
Following the launch of the survey Danneman, who featured in WatchPro’s 2014 Hot 100 list, was contacted by representatives of Swatch Group and invited to meet with them. Two weeks later Danneman flew out to Bienne to ‘discuss matters’. Danneman declined to elaborate further on the meeting.
Through The Watch Guy survey, Danneman sought the data of his own customers and of watch collectors in general, posting a link to the survey on numerous online watch forums.
Nearly 38% of the respondents were UK-based customers with the average amount being spent on servicing amounting to 860 euros (£607).
Independent servicing was being used by 96.4% of respondents with in-house or brand accredited service centres being used by 26.7%.
Independent service centres attracted full marks for all categories of customer satisfaction while there was a much more mixed reaction to in-house servicing. Customers felt that while brand service centres were well-qualified to work on watches they were deemed expensive and did not involve their customers in the whole process.
The most telling statistic showed that 98.3% of respondents would prefer to use independent service centres to work on their watches, while 83% stated that they were likely or very likely to take into account the lack of spare parts to independents when buying watches in the future.
Image: Kalory.co.uk
