Pre-owned comes of age with Seddiqi’s push into vintage Rolexes

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Two years after Rolex launched its Certified Pre-Owned programme, Dubai-based retailer Ahmed Seddiqi & Sons is taking the CPO concept beyond second-hand and into the realm of highly collectible vintage pieces — some more than 50 years old.

Next week, Seddiqi will open its first Rolex CPO store specialising in vintage models, in Dubai’s Wafi Mall. It has taken a site adjacent to its existing Rolex boutique and joined the two units to create an integrated sales space with around 120 vintage CPO pieces on display at any one time. Currently, Seddiqi has an inventory of about 400 pieces, to which it is constantly adding.

The initial outlay has been considerable. Chief executive Mohammed Seddiqi says he has spent in excess of $10mn on stock and a further $500,000 on servicing to meet Rolex’s CPO criteria.

Historically, the Middle Eastern market has concentrated on new watches but Seddiqi believes that, thanks to social media and the rising popularity of the biennial Dubai Watch Week event — organised by his company — appetites are maturing and the time is right for CPO.

“We started hunting for watches two years ago, on the local market and internationally,” Seddiqi says. “Our focus was totally different to any other certified, pre-owned concept existing in the market. If you go into a store that offers Rolex CPO, you will always see the Submariner, the Daytona, the GMT Master, the Explorer. We decided to look a little bit further and enhance the collection by searching for pieces that are even rarer than the Professional models.”

Accordingly, Seddiqi has focused on the Day-Date, a watch that enjoyed great prestige in the Gulf region 50 years ago and often featured exotic stone dials and lavish gem-setting on dial, case, and bracelet.

“Surprisingly, we found watches that are, in some cases, in ‘new old stock’ condition. People received them as gifts in the 1970s or the 1980s, and they were just kept in their drawers for all these years without them even touching them, and without them knowing what the value is now,” Seddiqi says. “Just 10 or 15 years back, people would have bought these watches for the gold value, not even the diamond value.”

The scheme treats pre-owned much as if it were a new product, with the reassuring presence of all the familiar retail appurtenances

Not any more. “Day-Dates will be starting at $35,000-$40,000, going all the way up to $300,000-$400,000 depending on the dial, [gem] setting and rarity,” Seddiqi says. “For the moment, we are thinking of very low margins — maximum 20 per cent — for us to understand what the market is looking for. We’re making less money, but I think Rolex made a good move introducing CPO, because they want to control the secondary market.”

The scheme treats pre-owned much as if it were a new product, with the reassuring presence of all the familiar retail appurtenances: box, papers, swing tag, and a two-year guarantee. “The vintage market is a market of initiates, not a market of shoppers,” says Remy Julia, head of watches at auction house Christie’s in Dubai. “The [United Arab Emirates] is the total opposite: it’s a market of shoppers in the mall buying watches with box and papers from the brand directly.”

He believes Seddiqi’s new venture will bring vintage to a wider public. “People were hesitant regarding the pre-owned market due to so many reasons: authenticity, ownership, watches that have been serviced over the years without original parts, and so on,” he says. “So, the fact that Rolex and Seddiqi have completely embraced the CPO project will give a boost of confidence for the overall [vintage] market.”

It is a market for which Seddiqi has great expectations. “Five years down the line, I believe that this is going to be an important business unit within Ahmed Seddiqi & Sons and also an important business worldwide,” he says. “We don’t know the exact number of Rolexes produced each year; some people say a million. But, looking at the global population, even a million new watches is not enough.”

During the past two years, Rolex has extended its CPO programme to around 70 retailers around the world, all of which have the ability to set the prices for their second-hand stock without any involvement from the brand. Watches are on sale at Rolex-owned Bucherer, and the scheme is proving popular with other, particularly large-scale, retailers such as US-based Tourneau, Watches of Switzerland, and The 1916 Company.

Brian Duffy, chief executive of Watches of Switzerland, says the premium on desirable CPO-eligible watches — which must be at least three years old — is between 10 and 70 per cent above its retail price, depending on the model.

Vacheron Constantin jumps on the CPO bandwagon

Two years after Rolex introduced its certified pre-owned scheme — selling restored second-hand watches with fresh warranties — Vacheron Constantin has announced its own equivalent programme.

The terms are broadly similar to those of Rolex. Vacheron services the watch and prepares it for sale with a minimum two-year warranty, alongside a digital passport containing information such as the piece’s ownership history.

The brand sees CPO as a service it offers to retail partners, all of which are free to set the price. Vacheron will not be selling CPO watches in its own boutiques, where it will continue to concentrate on current collection pieces. Nor will Les Collectionneurs — the maison’s selling collection of rare or unique vintage watches — be affected.

The CPO scheme was piloted on Watchfinder’s French network before being officially launched earlier this month on the Richemont-owned reseller’s online platform. Vacheron Constantin is also planning to extend the CPO programme to selected retailers.