Seiko

Visiting Grand Seiko Stores in 2015: New York Boutique

Hello Seiko Fans,

I am happy to report that I spent an afternoon in New York City visiting the Seiko Boutique. Seiko's flagship location in North America, it was a personal project of Mr. Hattori, who loves New York City. It opened in late summer of 2014 and serves as a magnet to draw in watch lovers who want to know more about Seiko's best watches.

Purists have visited the boutique before, most recently Ampurist to see Akira Oohira, the watch whisperer (CLICK HERE FOR THE STORY), and of course KIH, my co-moderator has visited (CLICK HERE FOR HIS STORY), but this was my first time.

PEOPLE

Since I was not coming in as an average customer or secret shopper, but rather as the Seiko Forum moderator, I contacted Seiko in advance and was privileged to meet and talk with Jim Turi - Boutique Director, Kathleen LeFevbre - Seiko Public Relations, and Tai Scors, Director of Advertising. They were friendly, helpful, and based on my visits to about 20 different watch companies and dozens of stores, among the most technically-informed of any marketing and sales personnel I have met.

LOCATION & FEATURES

510 Madison Avenue between 52nd and 53rd, Manhattan, New York.

The neighborhood is packed full of watch stores. Within a block or two, I spotted Harry Winston, Porsche Design, Rolex, Tiffany, Tourneau, Wempe, etc. Plus the Apple and Sony stores and a hundred other places to spend (and make) large quantities of money. So serious shoppers WITHOUT any knowledge of Seiko are bound to be thronging the sidewalks.

The boutique is immediately adjacent to Tourneau, a fact that Seiko salespeople play to their advantage. A few folks slip in each day, mistaking the Seiko door for the side door of Tourneau. More than a few have stayed around to check out the high-end Seiko products, and some leave with new watches on their wrists. In fact two Tourneau-bound customers wandered came in while I was there on a very cold and blustery day.

The boutique is compact but contains 8-9 wall cases and two counters, two video screens and a desk/table. Here’s a PR photo from Seiko showing the general layout.

OBJECTIVES

The boutique is intended to educate potential customers about $1000-$200,000 Seiko products, to enlighten visitors about Seiko, its history and technology, and to connect with serious, higher-tier buyers.

Seiko president Shinji Hattori wanted a NYC boutique to “show the essence of the Seiko brand and tell the untold story of Seiko” to North American customers.

The shop provides enhanced offerings compared with other Grand Seiko stores around the country, such as a few unique products and/or more inventory, a 3-yr warranty, giving the buyer his first overhaul/maintenance service free of charge, etc.

I was told there is no near-term plan to add more US boutiques.

EXPERIENCE SO FAR

Speaking with Jim Turi about their experience so far, in the first 6 months of operation their visitor traffic and sales are much higher than projected or expected. The vast majority of customers already know the GS brand and/or what model they want, but they want to touch before they buy.

Most GS buyers are watch savvy already and have Swiss watches from various manufacturers, including Rolex, Patek, etc. Since Jim used to sell BlancpaiN he is able to place Seiko into a context that these collectors can identify with:

The fastest moving watches have been Seiko high-end "tuna" divers, which sell out quickly, blue dial divers, and a few other Grand Seikos. They have sold a gold GS watch and will be delivering a Credor minute repeater soon ...

MY FIRST IMPRESSIONS

The boutique is clean and neat, with room for about ten people at one time. It was a bit smaller than I had imagined and the outside appearance is very low-key. Here’s a slightly blurry "selfie" shot taken at well below freezing temperatures…

There was a constant flow of visitors, and it seemed that a couple people came in to pick up watches, and one was dropped off. There were no sales that I noticed, but then it was 12 noon until 2 on a Wednesday, and there was a Seiko exhibit in Grand Central Station as part of Japan Week and some of the sales staff were down there.

PRODUCTS

Where do we start? There were plenty of watches on display and more in the back. I noticed these, thinking from memory:

Ananta

Astron

7x models

8x models

Brightz

Credor

Galante

New mechanical

Spring Drive

Grand Seiko

Mechanical

Manual wind

Automatic

High beat

Spring Drive

Quartz 9F

(Steel, titanium, gold)

Prospex

Marinemaster

Landmaster

Flightmaster

I took plenty of photos and will share a few with you here. I'll start with the wall display cases first (click on the image to see a larger version).

CREDOR

GALANTE

GRAND SEIKO MECHANICAL

GRAND SEIKO QUARTZ

GRAND SEIKO SPRING DRIVE

ASTRON

Now we can move onto the floor display cases, which house the less expensive lines carried in this boutique.

PROSPEX

ALL THE REST

If you can't find at least one watch in this store that you like, you're not likely to find one anywhere. Even if you don't buy on your first visit, you will be enlightened, educated and entertained (perhaps amused or stunned by some of the Galante watches).

I'll share a few individual pieces that appealed to me.

GRAND SEIKO

Rose GOLD Special High Beat GMT on strap

Similar in stainless steel

Special High-Beat with special dial

White dial without GMT

Silver brushed dial with GMT

Absolutely flat white dial with GMT, not high-beat

Manual wind 3-hand dress watch

Flat black dial with curved markers

Blue dial on Spring Drive with lume (boutique special)

Black dial Spring Drive with GMT

Spring Drive Chronograph GMT with dark blue dial (boutique special)

NOTE: All these watches are set and running. When did you last see that in a watch store??

Ladies Grand Seikos - diamond bezel, white dial

Diamond markers, pink mother-of-pearl dial

Diamond markers, black mother of pearl dial (whoops - someone slipped up, this watch's date is one day off!)

Grand Seiko Divers!

White dial quartz movement 200M (no date, for date-window-averse PuristS)

Black dial 200M

PROSPEX

Not Grand Seiko, but Prospex (professional specifications) line Marinemaster divers, with 1000M automatic and 600M Spring Drive in "tuna" cases. These are nicknamed for the large protective cylinder that surrounds the case.

Spring Drive diver in standard case 600M

Colorful Prospex kinetic (movement-powered, self-charging quartz) 200M with GMT

Seiko Prospex Solar Flightmaster with Brietling-esque slide-rule dial

Just to prove I was there, here is my Landmaster Automatic (still on California time) next to one of its cousins.

CREDOR

White dial automatic (boutique special). Credors are not sold through other stores in the USA.

GALANTE

Galante watches are not sold in other Seiko stores in the USA. But I that didn't stop your Seiko moderator from buying this one back in 2008 ...

G design dial, for Galante. This is the first NON-Spring Drive Galante I have seen. (Nicolas, notice, NO DATE)

Another automatic movement, minus date window.

Now for a more "conventional" Galante with Spring Drive movement. Most Galantes, like these, feature a unique case architecture, and flashy styling. And the date. (Where's Bernard?)

I saw these curved hands being made on my visit to the factory in October. LINK TO DIALS and HANDS post

Galante Spring Drive Chronograph

ASTRON

Here is a special edition, white dial solar Astron 8x series with ceramic bezel and bracelet links.

More Astrons. I won't get into the Astron GPS story, but it's worth hearing and you can check out these watches in good Seiko outlets around the USA.

If you are getting exhausted, (as my shutter finger was), you can grab a stool and flip through some of the tablets which help to explain the Seiko movement technologies. Here are a few slides:

CONCLUSION

I hope you have enjoyed this tour of the boutique. Although I was there to report and refrained from shopping, I can predict and warn you that there's a very good chance you will leave with a new Seiko on your wrist. Did I mention you can call them and they will happily ship a watch TO YOU? Just in case something in this post strikes your fancy...

Cheers,

Cazalea

This message has been edited by cazalea on 2015-02-23 13:20:57

Visiting Grand Seiko Stores in 2015: New York Boutique

Visiting Grand Seiko Stores in 2015: New York Boutique

That was an extensive report. I have been to that store twice...

Love your reports, a treasure trove of many watches. Thanks [nt]

A host of novelties on display

I disagree on two counts...

I stand corrected, you win a bonus...

Wonderful report!

Excellent report...

No plans to visit NYC . . .