The Breitling Watch Source Forums

hello,

just wondering does breitling make a certain amount of watches per model for each year or do they make alot for each model per year. thanks

Good question. I originally believed they manufactured a lot initally, but one would think they need to keep staff going all year round, so a monthly quota makes sense too.

Jim

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Jim

"You have Control".

Breitling doesn't release production numbers, but because they put every movement through the COSC for certification the COSC numbers give us a pretty good idea of total production - just over 150,000 in 2011. How that is broken out by model is pure speculation in most cases although you have to assume that supply and demand factors in. The only exceptions will be numbered limited editions which are obviously limited and are generally released to distributors over a fixed timeframe - an initial large release followed by further releases over a period of months (varying by model and number of pieces).

Historically Breitling also had 'special editions' that actually meant something (rather than just being an ordinary watch with special edition on the dial) and those were limited production runs where production was throttled to restrict the number of pieces available - the Lemania DB Cossie for example, but I don't believe that practice is still ongoing with current special edition pieces.

I haven't seen any specific data, but can tell you that my local AD commented that from her experience, Breitling makes significantly less number of watches than its luxury counterparts...for what it's worth.

Assuming the Breitling factories work 365 days of the year (which they don't) that's roughly 410 watches per day that are being churned out. According to one Breitling PR video, each watch takes up to 6 months to make from beginning to end (including the trip to COSC) and involves some "human intervention". Someone help me out here with the math here!

And here I though someone toiled over my watch for many hours polishing, assembling, tweaking, adjusting etc..

You're confusing duration and effort.

For example the COSC process takes more than 2 weeks of duration but requires absolutely no Breitling employee time between shipping and receiving.

Yes, but they are still producing a minimum or 400 watches per day! At that volume, they can't be hanging around the factory too long unless they have thousands of employees working on thousands of watches at the same time to achieve the amount of human intervention as implied in their promotional videos. One video (How they do it) states that it take 14 months to make one watch. Just curious what the real truth is.

One of Breitling's authorized service centers told me they observe a watch for a period of two weeks, and often quite more if it is an unusual model or if certain work was performed. So the waiting gives it some of the time (as noted).

If it was six months of continuous labor, it would have a six figure price tag and there would be some very bored employees

I don't see your point. Of course there are thousands (in fact tens of thousands) of pieces in various stages of production at any given point in time. Watches are produced with automated production lines, CNC machines, etc, etc, etc - there is human intervention but the notion that a watchmaker at Breitling lovingly hand crafts your watch while storing it on a bed of goose feathers every night for 14 straight months is pure marketing BS.

Well, Rolex produces close to 1M watches per year, that's about 2700 pieces a day, 7 days a week.
Anyway, have you seen the Super Factories - Breitling video?
It gives some level of appreciation of how the production process looks like.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hIiGRKbEHIE

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"It is just a matter of time!"

Wow that's just amazing 2700 pieces a day if you average them out. Seriously that's pretty cool