Omega X Swatch #moonswatch
I did something this weekend I have never done before. My youngest and I went to the collab drop #moonswatch for those who don't know; this is a collaboration between Omega X Swatch. Istanbul, NYC, Geneva, Hong Kong, London, Amsterdam, Melbourne 106 Stores globally…. 10's of thousands all tried to get a "moonswatch". We boarded the earliest train, arrived at Covent Garden at 0630 AM, and joined a queue I honestly never thought would be there. This was exhilarating; however, 4 hours later, it was apparent we were not walking away with a watch.
Ready to join the queue
The store only had 300 pieces (We didn't know that, it was from confirmed reports from other cities who launched earlier) and given we were 270 yards (yes, my 13-year-old son was on Apple Maps working out how long the queue was) from the store in a queue 4 for every yard …. Quick maths says that is at least 1000+ people, and we were not going to be successful.
Out of control, un-organised
However, something else was happening, the lack of organisation, security queue management meant the drop was slowly starting to unravel. They implemented "1 in 1 out" with people not following the quintessential "British" code of queue management! After security concerns, all 3 stores in London were closed. So numbers or not, it was going to come to an end.
Was it disappointing, yes ...
was it fun, yes …
Will I continue to try and secure one, No …. but not for the reasons above.
Stella marketing & hype
Has this left question marks over the effectiveness of this type of marketing? ABSOLUTELY NOT!
Just look at the features in the FT, Daily Mail, Hodinkee and many more publications google news 13,300,000 results
Looking at google trends, moonswatch comes out of nowhere, worldwide searches both, imager, video, shopping and web spike - this drop was only announced 3 days before the 26th! the halo effect on brand searches and breakout terms also seeing huge spikes. Whichever way you look at this, by all accounts looks like a massive success!
Limited, but not limited
The reality is those who managed to procure to resell are already doing so on StockX, Chrono, eBay; people still want the watch, and people are buying it, but for how long ... read below
Here is something even more interesting, Swatch has confirmed it isn't a limited edition, so why all the hype? Well, maybe it is because a Speedmaster can't be bought for less than £5000 so a £200 collab … Well, that's a no brainer if you love watches, and well, they are super cool, and the assumption was they were limited editions!
So why the hype? I honestly couldn't say, other than I thought this was something limited, scarce, so I got drawn into it. Back to my point earlier, will I buy the watch, not if it isn't a limited edition, but possibly for my son! Swatch and Omega managed to successfully "Hyjak" the collab scene in absolute style. They capitalised on the Yeezy, Supreme style product drop's we have seen in recent years. Nobody expected the reaction on the moonswatch drop in London; not a single person in the queue thought it; people were joining the line in Covent Garden at 0830 with looks of sheer shock as they walked down the line.
Ridiculous levels of PR!
Has there been a backlash, possibly? But, will that fizzle out and disappear, absolutely? Has Swatch & Omega created massive PR at a ridiculously low cost for brand exposure (globally), yes it has!
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