Audemars Piguet's watch prices remain stable after controversial Swatch collab
When the famed luxury watch brand Audemars Piguet announced a collaboration with Swatch last month, some Audemars collectors feared the worst. Rapper DDG said he
When the famed luxury watch brand Audemars Piguet announced a collaboration with Swatch last month, some Audemars collectors feared the worst. Rapper DDG said he would sell his $180,000 Audemars Piguet if the collaboration grew too big and cheapened the brand.
Members of the self-appointed horology community warned that one of the "Holy Trinity" of watch brands, famed for innovative complications, or features, and designs, had gone plastic. Yet a few weeks after the launch of the AP-Swatch Royal Pop collection, AP prices have held steady on the secondary market.
Despite predictions of a collapse in Audemars Piguet's brand value and exclusivity, experts say AP is still AP. "There has been no discernible impact on AP prices from the launch," said Hamza Masood, head of partnerships at WatchCharts, which tracks secondary values for all major AP models.
It's early, of course, but Masood said Royal Pop, the collection of brightly colored watches on lanyards, is part of AP's longer-term strategy of attracting the next generation of collectors.
The BriefWire