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Authorized dealers—Watches

KristinTech

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Checking things off my wish list—next up: Cartier watch to celebrate 10 years back at work after being a stay-at-home mom for seven. If I decide to go with an authorized dealer instead if the actual boutique, who should I consider? I live in IL. If I go to Cartier, I’d go to the Chicago boutique which is 10.25% sales tax now, eek!

I’d much rather take some savings down the road to the VCA boutique for my next wishlist item, lol.

Do we have a thread somewhere just devoted to trusted ADs? I’m brand new at this.
 

scarsmum

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I would recommend the real real website for watches.
 

scarsmum

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Adding, but that would be a preloved watch.
 

bcavitt

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If you go to cartier.com and click on "Find a Boutique", it lists the ADs by product line. I'm sure you can find one outside of Illinois to visit

Disclaimer: I do not work for an AD for Cartier.
 

KristinTech

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I would recommend the real real website for watches.

I’m glad to hear you like that site, @scarsmum ! Have you purchased through them before? I’m open to preloved.
 

bmfang

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Unless you are hankering for a mechanical Cartier watch, the vast majority of women’s watches in their lineup are quartz. And those rarely have anything go wrong with them. Last time I checked, they were still using ETA sourced movements from Swatch Group, though given Swatch wants to limit quartz and mechanical movement trade to select outside partners as well as to Swatch Group brands, it wouldn’t surprise me if there was a Ronda sourced quartz movement in Cartier’s these days.

You may want to consider pre-owned as there is usually a very large depreciation hit with watches from the fashion Maisons. I have seen some second hand dealers pick up Cartier Tanks’s for around 30-40% of MSRP, service and clean them up before listing them for sale at around 60-70% of MSRP.

E.g. one second hand dealer whose newsletters I am subscribed to has this listed:
http://clockmaker.com.au/w/p150.html (Cartier Tank Francaise Quartz Ladies for AUD$2900)

The same watch brand new from a Cartier boutique is AUD$4550. So buying second hand will save you 33% off RRP. Of course you won’t have that new item feeling, but that is a substantial saving.

Whether you’d be able to score that type of a discount at an authorised dealer is another story as I have not heard of too many ADs for Cartier apart from their brand owned concessions and boutiques. I did a search of US Cartier boutiques and ADs and they all appear to be company owned rather than having a display cabinet in Topper’s or Tourneau’s.

If you do go down the pre-owned route, try to buy one that comes with all boxes and papers.
 

Bron357

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I’m a watch guru, though my passion is collecting vintage manual watches.
You can buy excellent pre loved on eBay. Not “private sellers” (that requires confidence and knowledge these days) but the business sellers who also use eBay as a sales method.
Such watches usually come with full documentation, boxes and an authenticity guarantee and a considerable cost saving!
I have bought dozens of watches from eBay over the years and years.
If you let me know what model you are after, I’ll do a search for you.
 
Q

Queenie60

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Try Jomashop.com or authenticwatches.com. I have purchased from both and they're legit. Good luck.
 

Tophat1

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I highly recommend Swiss Watch Expo out of Georgia:

https://www.swisswatchexpo.com/

One of the owners used to repair for Cartier. I bought a tank from there that was half price and looked brand new. Completely serviced before it was sold. I’ve had it for 4 years now with no issues
 

KristinTech

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Unless you are hankering for a mechanical Cartier watch, the vast majority of women’s watches in their lineup are quartz. And those rarely have anything go wrong with them. Last time I checked, they were still using ETA sourced movements from Swatch Group, though given Swatch wants to limit quartz and mechanical movement trade to select outside partners as well as to Swatch Group brands, it wouldn’t surprise me if there was a Ronda sourced quartz movement in Cartier’s these days.

You may want to consider pre-owned as there is usually a very large depreciation hit with watches from the fashion Maisons. I have seen some second hand dealers pick up Cartier Tanks’s for around 30-40% of MSRP, service and clean them up before listing them for sale at around 60-70% of MSRP.

E.g. one second hand dealer whose newsletters I am subscribed to has this listed:
http://clockmaker.com.au/w/p150.html (Cartier Tank Francaise Quartz Ladies for AUD$2900)

The same watch brand new from a Cartier boutique is AUD$4550. So buying second hand will save you 33% off RRP. Of course you won’t have that new item feeling, but that is a substantial saving.

Whether you’d be able to score that type of a discount at an authorised dealer is another story as I have not heard of too many ADs for Cartier apart from their brand owned concessions and boutiques. I did a search of US Cartier boutiques and ADs and they all appear to be company owned rather than having a display cabinet in Topper’s or Tourneau’s.

If you do go down the pre-owned route, try to buy one that comes with all boxes and papers.

Thank you for the reply! Yes, I’m definitely open to pre-loved. Right now I’m on information overload, but I’ll start to absorb all the details with more research. I do need a watch that is large enough—my wrist measures 7 inches, and the Citizen watch I’m wearing now measures 8 1/4. I like that it’s not always tight! But it is probably looser than jewelers would recommend. Many of the pre-loved ones I’ve seen are for much smaller wrists.

Regarding depreciation, though, I don’t intend to sell it down the line. Anything can happen, of course, but it’s not a major factor for me.
 

Tophat1

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I also need 7-7.5” and while they are rarer, they definitely pop up. I forgot to mention another site for pre-loved: Gray & Sons jewelers out of Miami.
 

KristinTech

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I’m a watch guru, though my passion is collecting vintage manual watches.
You can buy excellent pre loved on eBay. Not “private sellers” (that requires confidence and knowledge these days) but the business sellers who also use eBay as a sales method.
Such watches usually come with full documentation, boxes and an authenticity guarantee and a considerable cost saving!
I have bought dozens of watches from eBay over the years and years.
If you let me know what model you are after, I’ll do a search for you.

@Bron357 I think I’m leaning toward the medium Tank Francoise. I also really like the roadster and ronde solo. The tank anglaise has a beautiful rose gold/stainless version. I like the two-tone look as long as the overall vibe is predominately stainless. Some of the panthere versions seem to have changed through the years—sometimes minimal YG and sometimes virtually half/half. I don’t want to go over $4K USD, and closer to $3K gets me closer to walking into VCA. ;-) I’ve been wearing a 32mm Citizen for a few months, just to be sure that I want a daily watch and to play with size. I like that size, and I can see going a little smaller or larger, depending.
 

bmfang

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Thank you for the reply! Yes, I’m definitely open to pre-loved. Right now I’m on information overload, but I’ll start to absorb all the details with more research. I do need a watch that is large enough—my wrist measures 7 inches, and the Citizen watch I’m wearing now measures 8 1/4. I like that it’s not always tight! But it is probably looser than jewelers would recommend. Many of the pre-loved ones I’ve seen are for much smaller wrists.

Regarding depreciation, though, I don’t intend to sell it down the line. Anything can happen, of course, but it’s not a major factor for me.

Tank francaise is always a classic line for women. Will never go out of style. As for depreciation, I’d rather get a well looked after pre owned one for less bucks than to pay full MSRP at a Cartier boutique. Let someone else take the RRP depreciation hit while you get the same piece for less. In fact that same second hand dealer I referred to just sent out another email today advising he had an almost brand new Tank Francaise for AUD$3500 with box and papers for sale as of today.

But for me, best option is to pick one up pre-owned or on the grey market. If it was a mechanical, I’d prolly advise to go via the boutique as I haven’t heard too many good things about sending mechanical watches back to grey market vendors like Joma or AuthenticWatches to get them fixed under their store warranty system (unless the mechanical movement inside is a relatively common movement in which case their in-house watch repair team should be sufficient). For quartz pieces though, those guys definitely should be on your radar alongside any pre-owned vendors.
 

bcavitt

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