Openwork: Inside the Watch Industry

Watch media looks nothing like it did ten years ago. Blake Buettner was one of Hodinkee's early writers, later managing editor at Worn & Wound, and built The Deep Track on his own. He joins Gabe Reilly and Asher Rapkin to talk about how watch journalism got decentralized. A Hodinkee Introducing article used to be enough to sell a watch. Now a launch gets spread across traditional outlets, watch influencers, YouTube creators and celebrity endorsements, and most of it runs through brand PR rather than marketing. We also get into why watch reviewers so rarely write a negative review, and the difference between critique and just being critical.

Then there's access. We talk about press trips, watches offered to writers, and whether influencers play by different rules than journalists do. The uncomfortable conclusion is that enthusiasts want independent, critical watch media but mostly won't pay for it. That's a big part of why so much talent has moved to brands and retailers. We also want to hear from you: which watch content creators do you follow, and why?

Before all that, Asher goes hands-on with the Gallet Flying Officer he just bought. It's Breitling's revived heritage brand, with a Sellita movement and a $3,100 price on the bracelet, and we look at how it stacks up against Longines, Oris and Hamilton. We also have an update on our tariff lawsuit, which was just heard at the U.S. Court of International Trade, and our plans for WatchTime New York. You'll find us at the Ming booth.

Openwork is a weekly podcast about how the watch industry actually works. An unfiltered look behind the scenes — no press releases, no hype, and no sponsored takes. Hosted by Asher Rapkin and Gabe Reilly, co-founders of Collective Horology. Available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube Music, or wherever you get your podcasts.

You can find us online at collectivehorology.com. To get in touch with suggestions, feedback or questions, email [email protected].

Eighteen months after Liberation Day, we look at where Swiss watch exports stand. Shipments to the U.S. are down 8.3% year to date but still up 8.8% versus 2024. Mainland China is down 23% from two years ago. Global exports are still up 1.7%, carried by the UK, India, Europe and South America. The growth is coming from watches over $50,000, while the $1,000 to $10,000 middle of the market gets hollowed out. Collector taste is moving away from steel sports watches and toward dress watches, complications and handmade pieces.

Rolex's new Padellone annual calendar is a business move. Starting at $59,000, it's another sign that Rolex wants to compete with Patek Philippe while Tudor handles Omega. We ask whether it will open buyers up to classical dress watches or stay inside the Rolex world, and which annual calendars we'd buy for the money instead.

Then there's Breguet. Under CEO Gregory Kissling, the brand has made some of its best product in years: the new Classique tourbillons and updated Traditions. At the same time, it has cut dozens of U.S. retailers in 18 months and is moving to company-owned boutiques. Lange, AP and Rolex all made that shift from a position of strength. We look at how Swatch Group mismanaged Breguet for decades, why the Hayeks are still involved, what happens to longtime Breguet clients when their dealer disappears, and what we'd do differently if we ran the brand.

Openwork is a weekly podcast about how the watch industry actually works. An unfiltered look behind the scenes — no press releases, no hype, and no sponsored takes. Hosted by Asher Rapkin and Gabe Reilly, co-founders of Collective Horology. Available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube Music, or wherever you get your podcasts.

You can find us online at collectivehorology.com. To get in touch with suggestions, feedback or questions, email [email protected].

Recorded live at Geneva Watch Days, this episode of Openwork sits down with Ming CEO Praneeth Raj Singh to unpack one of the strongest product runs in independent watchmaking: the Polymesh, Iris, Starfield, Lightning, and Comet. Hosts Gabe Reilly and Blake Buettner ask how much of it was planning versus luck, and Praneeth explains the shift from pandemic-era scramble launches to a more deliberate cadence, plus why Ming's graveyard of killed ideas is bigger than its actual catalog.

Praneeth gets specific on how Ming decides what to build and what to cut, including how a failed 3-kilometer dive watch indirectly produced the Bluefin's case construction and 600-meter water resistance. He talks through the tension between moving fast and giving platforms like the 37 Series more room to breathe, how Ming manages production partners as capacity gets squeezed by larger brands, and why some projects stay dead while others resurface years later in new form.

Praneeth also previews Ming's 10th anniversary in 2026: an expansion of the Superleggera lightweight collection into a chronograph, and the brand's first non-round case.

Openwork is a weekly podcast about how the watch industry actually works. An unfiltered look behind the scenes — no press releases, no hype, and no sponsored takes. Hosted by Asher Rapkin and Gabe Reilly, co-founders of Collective Horology. Available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube Music, or wherever you get your podcasts.

You can find us online at collectivehorology.com. To get in touch with suggestions, feedback or questions, email [email protected].

Gabe and Asher kick off Episode 93 with news: Collective is now an authorized Ressence retailer. Then they get into the week's biggest story out of Geneva Watch Days 2026: Breitling's Gallet relaunch, its inherited distribution network, the debt behind the bet, and why it beats the usual sub-$5,000 heritage revival.

The rest of the episode is Collective's annual rundown of the watches nobody else is covering: the Laurent Ferrier Classic Moon Dusk and its lumed double-moon phase, Singer Track's new V72 chronograph in gold panda dial, and the Atelier Wen x William Messina Inflection, a real collaboration with a Chinese-calligraphy and Arabic numeral dial.

They close with three more: the Urwerk UR-1001 Amadeus, a one-of-one engraved pocket watch that tracks centuries and millennia; the Marco Tedeschi MT 1.1, a crownless skeleton tourbillon from the watchmaker behind Kross Studios; and the Fears Brunswick 39 Perpetual Calendar, built on a customized Sellita and Dubois Dépraz module. Gabe and Asher use it to make the case that movement choice, not movement brand, should determine a watch's value.

Openwork is a weekly podcast about how the watch industry actually works. An unfiltered look behind the scenes — no press releases, no hype, and no sponsored takes. Hosted by Asher Rapkin and Gabe Reilly, co-founders of Collective Horology. Available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube Music, or wherever you get your podcasts.

You can find us online at collectivehorology.com. To get in touch with suggestions, feedback or questions, email [email protected].

Gabe Reilly and Blake Buettner record live from Geneva Watch Days to discuss the show’s atmosphere, the growth of independent watchmaking, and what Blake’s new role at Collective means for future content.

We break down major trends: independents gaining mainstream traction, the rising accessibility of creative watchmaking, and the cross-pollination of materials and techniques between affordable and high-end brands.

And of course, we highlight standout releases, including Ming’s 57.05 Comet worldtimer with its dynamic dial and tiered lugs as well as Bulgari’s surprising collaboration with Vianney Halter. We also react to Tudor’s North Flag release and explain why Geneva Watch Days continues to matter — especially for collectors — as it expands across the city and preserves its more relaxed, collector-focused vibe.

Openwork is a weekly podcast about how the watch industry actually works. An unfiltered look behind the scenes — no press releases, no hype, and no sponsored takes. Hosted by Asher Rapkin and Gabe Reilly, co-founders of Collective Horology. Available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube Music, or wherever you get your podcasts.

You can find us online at collectivehorology.com. To get in touch with suggestions, feedback or questions, email [email protected].

Breitling relaunches Gallet on September 3rd. Openwork hosts Gabe Reilly and Asher Rapkin unpack Georges Kern's play: chronographs at 3,000–5,000 CHF, an exploration story aimed at Bremont, Longines, and Tudor, sold in Breitling boutiques. Plus Universal Genève and Breitling's return to Watches & Wonders.

Then a listener question: how has working in the industry changed our collecting? It starts with selling nearly everything to help fund Collective Horology — what survived, what still stings (the Urwerk collaboration, the MB&F LM101, the Lange Odysseus), and rebuilding from an empty watch box.

What came back is different: neo-vintage tool watches, Holthinrichs, Ming, Singer. Buying on the merits instead of the hype, why an Aquanaut lands differently outside collector context, and the freedom that comes from retailing independent watches.

Openwork is a weekly podcast about how the watch industry actually works. An unfiltered look behind the scenes — no press releases, no hype, and no sponsored takes. Hosted by Asher Rapkin and Gabe Reilly, co-founders of Collective Horology. Available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube Music, or wherever you get your podcasts.

You can find us online at collectivehorology.com. To get in touch with suggestions, feedback or questions, email [email protected].

In Episode 90 of Openwork, Collective Horology co-founders Gabe Reilly and Asher Rapkin reveal that they've sued the U.S. federal government over the tariffs squeezing the watch industry and small businesses nationwide. They explain why they joined the suit alongside co-plaintiff Burlap Barrel, how the latest Section 301 tariffs continue to limit access to independent watches, and why it's the volatility of trade policy — not just the cost — that makes it so hard for small businesses to plan and grow.

The guys then dig into the numbers: the latest Swiss watch export data (up more than 11% year over year in June 2026, with the U.S. driving growth as China slides), the "bullwhip effect" tariffs are having on imports, and fresh quarterly earnings from Richemont, Swatch Group, and LVMH — where jewelry is powering the luxury recovery while watchmaking hangs tougher.

Finally, they turn to the shifting Rolex and pre-owned market, where Rolex's share of secondary-market value has hit a seven-year low even as its Certified Pre-Owned program grows into a juggernaut. They close on the retail arms race reshaping the industry — Bucherer's giant new Rolex flagship in New York, fresh boutiques nationwide, and what the rise of big-box players like Watches of Switzerland and the 1916 Company means for family-owned dealers.

Openwork is a weekly podcast about how the watch industry actually works. An unfiltered look behind the scenes — no press releases, no hype, and no sponsored takes. Hosted by Asher Rapkin and Gabe Reilly, co-founders of Collective Horology. Available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube Music, or wherever you get your podcasts.

You can find us online at collectivehorology.com. To get in touch with suggestions, feedback or questions, email [email protected].

A quick news note: On Friday, July 24, Collective, along with New York spice importer Burlap & Barrel, filed a lawsuit in the U.S. Court of International Trade challenging the federal government's latest Section 301 tariffs. We'll dig into the details on our next episode. In the meantime, you can read more here.

On this episode of Openwork, Gabe Reilly and Asher Rapkin talk with Karel Bachand, founder and chief engineer of Barrelhand, the San Francisco brand rethinking American watchmaking. Karel reverse-engineered an Urwerk as a teenager and cut his teeth on microgravity devices at NASA Ames before building Monolith — a mechanical watch designed from first principles as an aerospace tool, and one that couldn't be made in Switzerland.

The conversation digs into the question the industry avoids: after sixty years of luxury and heritage, what does a watch brand look like when it picks substance over story? Karel breaks down building an American supply chain from scratch, why decentralized manufacturing beats bringing it all in-house, and why a mechanical movement — not quartz or digital — is the right call for the harsh reality of a spacewalk.

It's also a frank take on collector blind spots, like the assumption that a modified Sellita movement is a cop-out instead of a deliberate, reliability-driven choice, and on growing the independent watch community by drawing in people from outside it. Explore Karel's work at barrelhand.com.

Openwork is a weekly podcast about how the watch industry actually works. An unfiltered look behind the scenes — no press releases, no hype, and no sponsored takes. Hosted by Asher Rapkin and Gabe Reilly, co-founders of Collective Horology. Available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube Music, or wherever you get your podcasts.

You can find us online at collectivehorology.com. To get in touch with suggestions, feedback or questions, email [email protected].

How did Tudor go from a brand you couldn't even buy in the United States to a half-billion-dollar powerhouse selling 300,000 watches a year? In this episode of Openwork, Gabe Reilly and Asher Rapkin trace the rise of Tudor — from its wilderness years in the shadow of Rolex to the 2009 reinvention that produced the Heritage Chrono, the Black Bay, the Pelagos, and an in-house movement. Along the way they unpack the ETA supply crisis, the 2008 financial crash, and Rolex's move upmarket that opened the door for Tudor to walk through.

But this isn't the usual "poor man's Rolex" conversation. Gabe and Asher argue that Tudor's real role is stranger and smarter than that: the gonzo laboratory where Rolex tests every material, case size, and business model it's too disciplined to try itself. Tudor is the black sheep by design — the pressure-release valve that lets Rolex stay conservative while quietly backfilling the market it left behind as prices climbed.

So where does it go from here? With 260-plus boutiques, celebrity wrists, and a brand that's broken into mainstream culture, Tudor looks like a company on the path to a billion dollars. The question is whether it gets there on brand alone — and whether a watch that exists relative to Rolex can ever truly stand on its own.

Openwork is a weekly podcast about how the watch industry actually works. An unfiltered look behind the scenes — no press releases, no hype, and no sponsored takes. Hosted by Asher Rapkin and Gabe Reilly, co-founders of Collective Horology. Available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube Music, or wherever you get your podcasts.

You can find us online at collectivehorology.com. To get in touch with suggestions, feedback or questions, email [email protected].

To mark 250 years of American independence, we're revisiting one of our favorite conversations: our sit-down with Josh Shapiro, the American independent watchmaker behind the Resurgence — the only watch that currently meets the U.S. Federal Trade Commission's standard for "Made in America." It's a fitting week to ask a question that feels newly urgent in an era of tariffs and reshoring: what would it actually take to bring watchmaking back to the United States at scale?

Josh takes us from the industry's staggering height — when American factories employed over 100,000 people and produced millions of chronometer-grade watches a year, so far ahead that the Swiss crossed the Atlantic in 1876 to study our methods and race to catch up — through the forces that dismantled it: the pivot from pocket watches to wristwatches, an aggressive Swiss cartel, Depression-era trade deals, and a postwar collapse that was already terminal long before the quartz crisis delivered the final blow. Along the way he explains why the single hardest thing to rebuild isn't machinery or capital, but people, and why "Swiss Made" and "Made in America" are two very different promises.

Told through the lens of building the Resurgence in his Los Angeles workshop — the CNC machines, the $150,000 balance-staff breakthrough, the North Dakota jeweler he coaxed out of retirement — this is a clear-eyed look at the slow, deliberate work of rebuilding an industry from the roots up, and what any of us can do to support it.

Openwork is a weekly podcast about how the watch industry actually works. An unfiltered look behind the scenes — no press releases, no hype, and no sponsored takes. Hosted by Asher Rapkin and Gabe Reilly, co-founders of Collective Horology. Available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube Music, or wherever you get your podcasts.

You can find us online at collectivehorology.com. To get in touch with suggestions, feedback or questions, email [email protected].