Bling Is Dead

Sad that it had to take such a massive global economic disaster, but you heard it here first folks - Bling Is Dead.

As you may know, I've been an advocate the death of bling for a long time. We've even advertised our watches as "anti-bling" as far back as 2005. And as some of you may know, I said famously, "to cut off my nuts if I ever put diamonds in a Men's Bathys Hawaii watch".

That pretty much sums up how I feel about this.

I've been thinking about Baselworld 2009, and I can't help but wonder what some of those "bling" companies are planning on doing? I mean how can you justify buying a diamond-encrusted watch when your pension has dried up? Or how can you wear such a thing when you know that your friends are losing their home or their life savings? It seems evil to do that now. Over the past few years, it seemed that simply adding diamonds was a way to make everything "new" and "cool". At JCK 2008 there were even 18Kt gold iPod cases set with pave diamonds. Doesn't that seem stupid now just 5 months later?

How can we promote this over-the-top consumerism of the Louis Vuittons and Jacobs & Co., etc when we see now where it all leads?

It leads to nothing folks.
It's a big empty room at the end of a hall you've spent a long time walking down.

Happiness and satisfaction come from within.
That's a simple thing to say, but a hard thing to practice.


I don't make Bathys watches so everyone will think how cool you are. I make Bathys watches because I wanted people to have a really high-quality long-lasting timepiece that didn't cost a bunch of extra money. If they get happiness while wearing a Bathys - awesome. As it says in my catalog, "maybe rather than loving your watch, you should love the life your watch lets you live".

And by that I mean, rather than buying a watch to own something that makes you happy, maybe you should think of what you can do that will really make you happy.

Sure, I'd like it to be a Bathys strapped to your wrist, but that's not the point. The point is to get out and do something that improves your feeling of well-being. For the price of the diamond bezel on that hypothetical new watch you want, you could take the family on a trip to Europe. Which one will be more important 20 years from now?

I googled Bling is Dead just now and I think there's a rising sentiment along these lines:

Here's some links to check out:

From the Wall Street Journal...
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122351779589918041.html

Here's a great one from the UK...a place where you can turn in people who seem to have a little too much bling (and thus might be criminals):
http://www.cleveland.police.uk/news_resources/press_releases/080128_TooMuchBling.htm

Of course maybe bling WON'T die...here's an article from 2005 asking for it to expire directly...but obviously it didn't.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/22/AR2005122202125.html


But in my opinion, the events of recent weeks will be the catalyst to end this culture of excessive materialism once and for all.

OK, well that's all for now. I'm going to post again in the next few days with some news and some photos.

Aloha,
John

(ps thanks to Kurt, Brad and Lorenz for their posts!)