As of today, the Apple Watch will be available in stores. But if you’re looking for a little more info and want our first impressions on what it’s like to wear an Apple Watch, the Watch Insider family has you covered! In this article from Watch-Insider.com, guest contributor Bani McSpedden goes in-depth on life with the Apple Watch on the wrist. McSpedden, the watch editor of the Australian Financial Review andwatch-next.com, was one of the only traditional watch journalists invited to Apple headquarters in Silicon Valley for a briefing on the Apple Watch and the opportunity to experience it before its release. See below for McSpedden’s full report.
Keeping a watch on Apple…
With deliveries of the long awaited Apple Watch commencing in many countries this month, no one will be watching more closely than traditional watch brands.
This was flagged at the recent Baselworld watch fair, where despite not being on show, Apple’s newcomer was a hot topic, with opinions divided on the impact it will have on an industry dominated by the Swiss, and to a lesser extent the Japanese.
The head of LVMH watch brands Hublot, TAG Heuer and Zenith, Jean-Claude Biver, told attendees Apple was unlike previous competitors in that “they make as much in a month as the whole Swiss industry makes in a year.”
On record as saying he had initially been disappointed by the shape of the Apple Watch, he told me before the Basel fair that “the more I see the watch, the more I learn about it, the more I believe in its success.”
Apple is a threat for another reason – it’s a “cool” brand, the likes of which the Swiss have not come up against before.
In their favour, the Swiss, and at the high end Japan’s Grand Seiko, produce hand-crafted timepieces of such quality and complexity that they should continue to win hands-down when it comes to character and cachet. They are also largely obsolescence-proof.
