Thursday, September 15, 2005

But the Chinese Could Never Own the Swiss?

More incendiary findings on the topic of foreign parts and/or foreign assembly of "Swiss made" watches.

It is not generally known that quite a few Swiss companies have watches assembled in China for export to North America, Asia and even Europe, where the brand name is more important than the “Swiss made” label. Such watches may consist of a Chinese case and a Chinese crystal, a Taiwan-made dial and metal bracelet and Japanese hands.
And even more interesting what happens if a Chinese company owns a Swiss one? Gasp....
Chung-Nam Watch Co. Ltd was established in 1935 in Hong Kong. It owns the world wide rights to the Bruno Banani brand watches. It also controls the Roamer Company in Solothurn and thus, has Swiss made watches in its portfolio.


From the Brand Frame of the Chung-Nam Website
But no, if you look in the Roamer site you won't find anything about Chung-Nam. Funny that.
Keep it coming Luger.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I bought a Colibri watch recently. When I looked at the web site several of the watches were described as having been "Swiss Made". Although the watch I ultimately bought did not say this, by association I thought it was. When I went to change the battery I found the watch had been made in China.