Ralph Lauren Watches: Don’t Call Them “Fashion Watches”
Main image source: The Rake
Note: I originally wrote this as an “Audicle” for The Real Time Show. If you have some time, please do check this episode out, as well as the associated team discussion!
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In episode 67 of The Real Time Show, I made the case that anyone claiming to be a watch lover is doing themselves a disservice by dismissing products from large luxury brands as “fashion watches”.
Granted, as with every product category, there’s still a fair amount of garbage, so you can continue walking by the Armani Exchange, Burberry and (shockingly) Tom Ford watch displays without a second thought.
But, when you look at brands such as Cartier, Hermes, or Louis Vuitton - brands that really only operate at the very high end of the price scale - there’s a good chance that, setting aside stylistic preferences, the watches they’re offering are objectively “good” watches.
As I said in the Audicle, these brands have to be very mindful of their brand perception, so they have every incentive to create excellent products in every category in which they are active. For watches in particular, what they lack in watchmaking heritage they can mitigate with well-loved design codes.
After years of investment and trial-and-error, the brands I just mentioned seem to have finally generated some traction in “watch nerd” circles (I’m personally very taken by the new Tambour). There is, however, one glaring outlier, a very well known brand, a favorite of mine, and I’d argue one of the most influential in the history of fashion, which did not create as much buzz with their foray into watches, despite some very, very well-done offerings.
I’m talking about Ralph Lauren, and in today’s Audicle I’m going to cover:
The first Ralph Lauren watches and how they came to be
Why I think this attempt at breaking into the watch market fizzled
The current state of Ralph Lauren watches
What I think the brand could do to build on what it has
Quick break here to be fully upfront with my bias. Polo Ralph Lauren is one of my first great menswear loves. I’m fascinated by the imagery surrounding the Polo shirt, the crossover appeal of sportswear like the legendary “Snow Beach” jacket, and the fact that the brand can be just as well known for formal wear with the Purple Label line as it can with Western wear via RRL.
Regardless of how deep I get into clothing, I will always - always - circle back to Ralph Lauren and its various universes.
Being a little more objective, it’s kind of wild that a brand can be known for - and excel in - such a broad spectrum of design styles and price ranges; it’s as if Ferrari were as well known for sports cars as they might be for pickup trucks and compact cars.
Perhaps it’s this successful versatility that gave them the confidence to try their hand at watches, and I remember seeing the “teaser” for Ralph Lauren watches over a decade ago. I was expecting something more along the lines of what Tommy Hilfiger, a generally accepted peer brand, was offering, that is to say branded quartz watches retailing for, at most, several hundreds of dollars.
Wow, was I shocked when I saw the full reveal!
These were watches costing thousands and thousands of dollars, some well into the five-figure range.
As I dug into the project a little more, I found out that the seemingly inflated prices weren't simply resting on the mythical Ralph Lauren name, but rather an all-star team of watchmaking heavy hitters.
The way I’ve heard the story, Ralph the man knows the head of Richemont, and a partnership was formed between Ralph Lauren the company and Richemont brands such as Piaget and JLC, with those watchmakers providing movements (and presumably manufacturing capabilities generally) for Ralph Lauren watches.
The two men really must have been good friends, because stylistically (if not realistically…) Ralph Lauren watches were absolutely positioned to cannibalize Cartier, Piaget and JLC sales, but the deal went ahead, much to Ralph Lauren’s benefit.
Horologically, I’ll point out here that this is already a step ahead of how brands such as Hermes operated for a long time. Whereas they would go pretty much only for ETA movements before committing to the Vaucher Manufacture, Ralph Lauren the brand and the man did have some workhorse-powered models (which are still quite handsome I might add), but they were already swinging for the fences with high-horology options, perhaps because the man is a well-known watch collector and wanted to carry out the project properly.
Then we get to the designs. The playbook for any non-watch brand trying to get into watches is to lean into their aesthetic signatures, and Ralph Lauren has these in absolute spades. They can do preppy, they can do workwear, they can even do art deco, despite having no legitimate claim to being born in any of these circles; with Ralph Lauren it just comes down to sheer skill in storytelling.
The Ralph Lauren brand set up its watch portfolio in the worlds of motoring, equestrian, and safari-style watches for their collection, but me describing them this way does no justice to the beauty and uniqueness of how some of these watches turned out.
My personal favorite: the automotive double tourbillon, talk about entering with a bang! The watchmaking complications are impressive, sure, but what strikes me most about this watch is the burlwood bezel. I have not seen this done elsewhere, and anytime I see it - literally anytime - my mind goes to the Great Gatsby, Bugatti cars and very, very old money.
Ralph Lauren did not have to go so hard out of the gate, but they did! Note, however, that the watch above looks like a render, I wonder how many of these were actually made…(Image source: www.ralphlauren.com).
That is the power of the Ralph Lauren brand!
And yet…
As far as I can tell, these watches were a flop.
I have never seen a Ralph Lauren watch in person, and though offerings on Chrono24 are limited, what you can find is priced well below what the MSRP.
So, what happened?
In my mind, it comes down to timing, marketing, positioning and sizing.
I’ve already sort of touched on the timing aspect, but as much as I commend the brand’s desire to do things properly, it started off too strongly. What Ralph Lauren created were not fashion watches at all, but rather watches aimed squarely at “watch nerds”, and we know how that crowd reacts instinctively to watches from brands that don’t usually make them.
Maybe the idea was just to sell a couple of the very high end pieces and focus on the lower-end (but still pricey) time-only models to drive most of the revenues. Even then, the brand must have been counting on die-hard Ralph Lauren fans, not necessarily well acquainted with high-end watches, for whom hundreds of dollars is a lot to spend on a “nice” watch, and ultimately that group didn’t show up and convert in great enough numbers.
On that note, the marketing was just off for these watches, in the sense that in my mind, there was none. I can’t think of a single ad for Ralph Lauren watches, and in fact the only reason I knew they existed at all was because I had a habit of visiting their website regularly.
Again, this is just a hypothesis, but with its huge war chest - which allowed it to go big with its watches right out of the gate - surely Ralph Lauren could have gotten more eyeballs, both watch nerd and not, onto the brand by doing more on the marketing side. I’m not a huge fan of celebrity ambassadors, but a well-known celebrity on choice billboards and in key airports around the world would have gone a long way.
This leads to positioning, a key aspect of products with the Ralph Lauren empire since you can spend anything from 40 dollars to 10,000 dollars depending on which of the brand’s many lines you shop in.
Interestingly, Ralph Lauren watches had “Ralph Lauren” on the dial; not Polo Ralph Lauren, not RRL, not Purple Label, but Ralph Lauren.
Clearly, this, and the font used, were meant to evoke heritage that didn’t exist, again, a running theme with Ralph Lauren but not a problematic one since the brand handles design so well. But when rubber meets the road, just how was Ralph Lauren going to sell these?
Again, if it had been up to me, I would have associated Ralph Lauren watches with boutiques only, and had a separate section set up just for watches, with specially trained staff on-hand to guide new and existing, but curious, watch lovers on their journey with Ralph Lauren timepieces.
Finally, we get to sizing, which is just confused. The partnership between Ralph Lauren and Richemont started in the 2000’s. During much of that time, large watches were all the rage, and Ralph Lauren followed suit. For instance, the brand produced a handsome-looking, JLC powered chronograph, but…
It’s 45 mm!
How could a brand like Ralph Lauren, known for the timelessness of its designs, be swayed by the tastes of the early 2000’s?
If they were looking to the Art Deco period for inspiration, why could they not also draw upon that period’s slender wristwatch dimensions?
The sizing is unfortunately what holds back the brand from being re-discovered today. I mean, can you imagine how good the deal would be if you could get a 38 mm, JLC powered chronograph for around 4,000 euros?
It’s just such a strange thing to say that Ralph Lauren, this absolute juggernaut of a success story and luxury brand, dropped the ball on marketing, positioning and design, but that’s where we are, and an even stranger twist, Ralph Lauren’s watches today are where the brand should have started in the 2000’s!
If you go to the website’s watch section, you’ll see two main families of watches featured: the Polo Bear watch, and what the brand calls “The Polo Watch”. The Polo Watch is the type of thing you would find at Armani Exchange, it’s gaudy, it’s cheap-looking (not at all cheap though!), and not at all what I think of when I think of Polo Ralph Lauren.
To me, this design language actually could have been used as the foundation for an RLX performance line of watches, but as it stands, I’d avoid the Polo Watch altogether.
The Polo Bear watch though, that is something special. The Polo Bear is truly an icon, and people will happily pay upwards of 400 or 500 euros for a knit sweater featuring the character, so to have various dial and strap combinations featuring a Polo Bear in different outfits is brilliant.
They’re a little expensive for time-only watches, but then again you get a Swiss movement, a nicely signed crown, and, most importantly, with other time-only watches, you don’t get the iconic Polo Bear, so credit is due to the brand for using its heritage well here.
In fact, Wei Koh, the founder of Revolution, actually collaborated with Ralph Lauren to make a limited edition “Negroni Bear” watch, an endorsement in the watch world if there ever was one!
My only gripe: they’re mostly 42 mm, whereas 38 mm or 40 mm would have been a more classic size. As far as I can tell, one 38 mm model does exist, the Ralph and Rickey Bear model, so the foundation is there, and at quite a lower price than the 42 mm models.
Then we get to the brand’s biggest recent release, the Polo Ralph Lauren Vintage 67. Announced at the end of 2022, this model enjoyed a fair amount of buzz for a Ralph Lauren watch. I myself have not handled one, but Rob has, and he and Alon discussed it at length in episode 15 of The Real Time Show.
Quick summary: Rob was impressed!
I love the fact that Ralph Lauren produced such a quality piece, but again I’m confused by the positioning. As the dial clearly states, like the Polo Bear watches, the Vintage 67 falls under the “Polo” line, but to me, with its bund strap, classically-styled hands and rail-road inspired numerals, it should be a RRL offering.
Also, again, where is the marketing for this? How is Ralph Lauren going to capitalize on the positive press this watch received when it was announced?
If you’ve listened to these Audicles before, you know I like to play pretend-CEO, but before I do that, here’s a quote from 2020, from Guillaume Tetu, the head of watchmaking at Ralph Lauren:
“…we continue to produce and sell more high-end models, including timepieces worth up to 65,000 dollars in the Western collection. The Stirrup line remains the brand’s best-seller in the 2,000 dollar segment”.
There are two surprising pieces of information here, and I’ll use them now as I somewhat humbly suggest the course of action I’d follow for Ralph Lauren to make a dent - however small to start - in the watchmaking category, with the intent of building up to selling more of those fantastic, high-end timepieces the brand introduced years ago:
Make the Polo Bear watch the foundation for Polo Ralph Lauren watches. If possible, make a smaller model and remove the Polo Ralph Lauren branding at 9 o’clock. These would only be sold in Polo boutiques and online, and I encourage the brand to play up its current strap offerings, which, while expensive, look very distinctly “Polo” and could be a good margin driver.
In the future, perhaps Polo Ralph Lauren could offer another watch, stylistically in-keeping with the prep style of the mid-century, to round out this price tier with something a bit sportier.
Ditch the Polo Watch entirely as it exists today, but use it as the foundation for RLX-branded sports models. The colors would go well with active-wear, and the division’s focus on sustainability leaves open some interesting possibilities with regards to watches.
Re-brand the Vintage 67 as a RRL model, and use that as an entry point leading up to some of those 65,000 dollar Western watches.
On that point, while I’m surprised those watches sell so well, I hope Ralph Lauren is doing whatever it can to get that small niche of buyers talking about their watches, in hopes of converting other, potential buyers in their friend and colleague circle.
Everything else, including the Stirrup collection, should be moved to the Purple label, with models re-sized where necessary (no more 45 mm chronographs!).
All of these watches should be sold in their respective boutiques with appropriately trained staff.
All of these different lines should be supported with appropriate ad campaigns, which would include carefully selected brand ambassadors and product placement opportunities.
I’ve browsed the site several times while writing this article, and what strikes me is just how much “watch stuff” you can buy: tooled leather straps, alligator straps, steel bracelets and a deployant buckle.
It’s so clear that the brand understands watches, and “all” (in heavy quotes) Ralph Lauren has to do now is customer outreach and education. With that said, I really hope Ralph Lauren keeps their watch division top-of-mind because I’d love nothing more than to see them produce an H08 type of watch that’s met with considerable success.
In the meantime, if you haven’t done so, definitely check out Ralph Lauren’s watch page, it only bolsters my argument that a “fashion watch” isn’t necessarily a terrible watch, and in the case of Ralph Lauren, a fashion watch can indeed be a fantastic watch.