This Swatch was given to me as a present. And while I’m not a huge fan of it’s aesthetics, it is comfortable, reliable, quite cheap and I feel quite warm towards it.

Swatch always sells a ridiculous number of watch styles, but common among them are all the other attributes: low prices, some element of personality and general stability. These qualities have defined the swatch brand, which emerged in response to the rise of cheap quartz watch manufacturers in east asia in the 1960s and 70s such as Seiko & Citizen. The influx of cheap watches took away large swaths of market share from the Swiss who specialized in carefully crafted, expensive, mechanical movements.

Swatch i.e. ‘second watch’ (I always assumed the s stood for Swiss) was the Swiss response to cheap Asian watches. Automated assembly, simplified mechanics, cheap prices and personal expressiveness to regain the watch market. Interview for Princeton Class of 2021