Swiss and German watches
Watches come in all shapes and sizes. If you are looking for a watch from a real watch manufacturer, not from a fashion brand, you will soon end up with a Swiss or German watch brand. Switzerland and Germany are known for their watches because they have been offering excellent quality and beautiful designs for decades. Swiss watches have the designation Swiss made, which is known worldwide and is still an important factor for many people when purchasing a watch. However, German watches are just as good in quality and often use Swiss movements. The difference is in the country of production. Are Swiss watches better than German watches?
As said, watches from Switzerland have the designation Swiss made, which still has a lot of value in the field of marketing. Watch enthusiasts find this predicate important because it says something about where the watch was made. But also about the quality. But to label Swiss watches as better than German watches is not enough. German watch brands also have a very good reputation. Think of Davosa and Fortis in the middle segment in terms of price. In the lower segment, German watch brands such as Junkers, Iron Annie and Zeppelin are good examples of brands that are popular and successful. Of course there are also Swiss and German brands that you better ignore. For example, they are too expensive or do not offer the quality you would expect from watches produced in these countries.
In Switzerland, of course, you have some beautiful watch brands such as Breitling, Tag Heuer, IWC and many others. Brands that are in the higher price segment and are not affordable for everyone. But there are also many other Swiss brands that are affordable, such as Cornavin, Glycine and Epos. Especially Epos is a leading watch brand that has been making fantastic watches for decades. However, the brand is quite unknown because it has no major marketing campaigns and prefers to invest its money in the brand itself. This means you can buy beautiful Swiss made watches at Epos for a fraction of the price of other well-known Swiss watch brands. We find Epos an interesting brand because you get Swiss quality for a very attractive price. In addition, the Epos watches have a very high level of finish and a sublime automatic movement from ETA. The watches are very beautifully packaged and of course a 2-year warranty is provided.
After all, quality costs money. Because salaries in Switzerland are higher than in EU countries, a watch from Switzerland will generally also be more expensive. A German watch brand can have the exact same movement type and finish level, but still be considerably cheaper. This has to do with the aforementioned difference in salaries, but also because Swiss brands (can) ask for more money for their watches through the Swiss made designation. If you do not value the Swiss made designation, you can very well succeed with buying a German watch brand.
A good example are the Junkers watches. Junkers is a German watch brand that mostly uses Swiss and Japanese movements in its watches, with production taking place in Germany. The watches are fully assembled in Germany. The new watch brand Iron Annie also comes from the same factory. This watch brand also uses Swiss movements. The design language is retro at Iron Annie, where Junkers offers the popular Bauhaus series and real pilot watches. The nice thing about both German watch brands is that they make very affordable watches. You already buy a Junkers or Iron Annie watch that is completely made in Germany and has a Swiss quartz movement from 199 euros. That is really affordable for a real watch brand!
Another German watch brand that we have already briefly mentioned above is Davosa. This brand also produces its watches with Swiss movements. The most popular series from Davosa are the Argonautic and Ternos that use an automatic movement that is Swiss made. Quality is paramount at Davosa. The sporty Argonautic and Ternos watches have a good automatic movement, above-average water resistance and a beautiful finish. The prices are interesting as well, and start from 650 euros. For this price you have a beautiful watch with Swiss movement that you will enjoy for years.
In short, in terms of quality, there are not many differences between good German and Swiss watch brands. The Swiss brands are often a bit more known to the wider public. Almost everyone knows Rolex, Omega, Breitling and Tag Heuer. Watch brands such as Davosa and Fortis may be less well-known, they produce excellent watches with a very attractive price level.