Has the Swatch Group devalued the Longines heritage? I would tend to argue yes in some respects, but then, Longines sales within the Swatch Group are pretty decent, second behind Omega.

In good quality jewellers and dedicated watch retailers, you will always see Tissot and Longines along competitor TAG Heuer. Throw Rado into that group, this makes up the majority of their high-end products. It is much harder to find Hamilton and Mido in general retailers in Western Australia. As expected, Calvin Klein is found in lower-end retailers along with Pulsar, Citizen, Seiko and Lorus.

The Swatch Group has a number of brands within their brand group so there is competition for relevance. I am sure competition is fierce for advertising funding and Longines does well in this respect. Longines brands sit within the high-range group along with Union Glashütte and Rado. This group is well defined, as Glashütte based watchmaker Glashütte Original is a class above Union Glashütte.

This is a proper comparison, I feel more should be done to promote these two other brands with the high-range group. To be fair, Longines is by far the best promoted and recognised brand within the high-range grouping. The mid-range group is the domain of Tissot, Hamilton and Certina. I find it somewhat unusual that Calvin Klein, a fashion brand, sits alongside Mido with Balmain a relative unknown. Based on searches on the Balmain webpage, there are no retailers in Perth or Australia in general.

Longines heritage dates back to 1840, Tissot is not long after that at 1853, TAG Heuer is 1860 so they all fall within a fairly defined period. They all have created mechanical innovations so they are decent brands with well documented heritages. Omega [1848] is the brand of choice to take on the dominance of Rolex [1905] with Blancpain [1735] and Breguet [1775] positioned at a much higher level. Yes, whilst Longines has been devalued somewhat, they are positioned about right.