Hi there,
I have been looking at A Lange & Söhne (ALS) vs F. P. Journe (FPJ) pieces for a while. For ALS, the piece I am interested in the most is the Zeitwerk. In the FPJ current collection, the Souverain or Automatique are really cool!
Now, the reality is, I prefer to go grey for either of those options, for various reasons. For the Zeitwerk, it's because ALS Zeitwerk can be found at a discount, and for FPJ, because I don't want to wait. However, I was talking to a ALS rep and they said this about buying grey:
I never recommend gray market retailers because you do not get a factory warranty, and a brand like Lange can be pricey to service. Even if you can get a better price, it's still a lot of money to buy from someone unauthorized. And, should you choose to sell or trade the watch later on, you won't get as much with it being sold to you on the gray market originally.
Is there truth to the aforesaid? Also, as I will be buying from Chrono24, is there a way to double check with those brands if the watch I end up getting is legit? Since, I will have 14 days as per Chrono policy to return / flag something.
What are the statistical odds that you will actually need to use the warranty? I would imagine that the odds of a high end watch breaking down spontaneously in the first 3-5 years after production is less than 1% ? I am assuming that the warranty period is not more than 5 years and the warranty only covers manufacturing defects and not normal service which the watch would not need in the warranty period anyway. What am I not understanding?
I agree with you! I think the rep was saying like oh you better watch out in case something goes wrong, we won’t cover you bc no warranty