Let's Talk about San Martin

I love it!  I hope that the Chinese do to Swiss watchmaking what Swiss watchmaking did to the French and English!  

I mean, if someone can produce a much lower priced good with equal reliability and quality, they deserve to take over the market.  With fast prototyping and advanced machining, I suspect manufacturers like San Martin will soon be producing watches every bit as reliable and with build quality equal to the Swiss - if they're not there already!

I agree. I think we will start to see San Martin become more like a traditional micro brand and it will be interesting to see if this approach serves them well enough to stop making homages altogether. They have carved themselves a nice niche in the market where they cater to people who want a homage but are willing to pay a bit more to get a very decent watch also. Moving themselves up the watch tires will put them into a competitive price bracket with other very good micro brands, so it'll be interesting to see how that goes for them. 

Certainly seems like a trend at the moment for brands to push themselves into higher price brackets.

I just purchased a bronze San Martin watch to try out the experience of wearing a bronze watch. The PT5000 movement seems pretty good. The overall quality is really good and the only thing I would pick on is the somewhat stiff screw down crown. 

I've been waiting for that for a while. For some reason it feels to me like they are always "at the cusp" of being able to push their own designs, as from a spec perspective their offerings are identical with many microbrands. But so far nothing has really clicked with me.

love the way san martin move up their game, there is no shame for being homage microbrand first. we gotta start somewhere i guess

I was thinking of trying a San Martin Bronze also to see if I like Bronze watches

I believe Phoibos started with an homages and I think they are pretty much 100% original designs now. I will say I like the Phoibos original designs a bit more than San Martins so far.

Have owned several San Martin and Phoibos models. Is obvious that both are reinvesting their profits into choosing higher quality manufacturing. 
 

Considering that even with "Swiss" and "Japanese" watches, pretty much every bracelet/clasp and most cases are made in China, I see no reason these two brands cannot outperform Seiko and Swiss watch brands, and at a fraction of the price. 

I didn’t think I would really like it but there is something about the curiosity on how the bronze will transform as I wear it which is very engaging and fulfilling.

Cool I think I'll pick up on at some point. I may order the Bronze Zelos Hammerhead though instead.

I actually have that San Martin 62 mas chrono on order right now (and it is winding through alibaba's incredibly slow shipping).  I agree, the case is 62 mas, but very little else is.  It's a very attractive diver/chrono.

First San Martin for me.  Really interested in seeing if the quality matches the reputation.

One thing San Martin does which isn't mentioned often is custom dials.  Many of their watches are available with sterile dials.  Any of those can be customized for less than $50.  You can use custom font, color, logo etc.  They will email you proof dial pictures until you are happy with the design.  I had a GMT made for my father with his name in cursive in place of the brand name.  It's extremely classy looking and he loves it.  The hard part is picking out fonts for each line.  You will need to send them the font files. 

PC --

I have too: it is an Oris Sixty-Five homage (approximately; i don't think Oris made a dial like this) which i had customized as you can see.    It truly is a great, practical, watch:

• While self-evidently a bronze case, it is not the ghastly heavy, over-wrought cases of so many bronze designs (save the Fleigers).   
• The lovely sapphire crystal makes me smile every time i look at it; again, very distinctive while being tasteful.
• The dial -- and i did not expect this when i ordered it -- is shockingly at-a-glance legible; better i think than any of my other watches.  
• On top of all that, and partly due to its modest weight and leather strap, it is much more comfortable to wear than i find other divers.

So i find San Martin SN042-g a fantastic selection; it is on my winder now for casual wear.    It splits that duty with a Cronos Subby, which is only used for heavy outdoors work.

-- gary ray

PS My PT5000 loses about 6 s/d and i may get it regulated this spring.  

i'm afraid that you should count me in the group that hasn't been impressed by the their "original" designs.   They demonstrate San Martin's mastery of metal finishing for sure, but to show off those surface finishes there is just too much metal in the resulting watch.   Their latest limited addition SN0010 shows this:

A lovely piece of finishing, true, but as a practical watch?   And they even take over the top in divers (a genre no stranger to too much case material) with the SN025:

Look, i'm willing to grant practically anything is a matter of taste . . . except, well, that.   

Finally there is the SN026:

The problem with this design is that, for a dress watch, it is a 178g behemoth -- fully 20g heavier than my Submariner homage -- with little grace.  We males wear a dress watch for jewelery in the office; it should not call attention to itself silently speak elegance.  Sadly, although beautifully constructed this design simply doesn't do it.

I love San Martin's and have a dress watch on my wrist while i type these words (during the workday, shhh!).   I has exactly the grace and lovely style that the SN025 lacks . . . but it is the SN059 . . . which is a DateJust homage.   I would happily wear a San Martin to work, but it has to be better than the DateJust.

-- gary   

Since this post I have sold all my San Martins and won't buy another. Customer service from the Ali "official stores" is laughable. Until SM gets their CS nailed down, the brand is dead to me.

If they are going to do a large volume business in the West and KEEP customers, they are going to need better understand Western customer service expectations.

SM no longer offers this option.

Wow.. I just had one made for my nephew in April. They put his name on the dial of a panda chronograph and it came out first class. I have $4000 watches that don't look that good. It was the forth custom I had done over the last few years. That was the best value in watches. Honestly, I can't believe they did it for the small fee of $25. They should make the fee $100 and bring the option back. This is sad news.

I've had good and bad CS experiences on Aliexpress so would agree if they want to take the next step they need to separate themselves from Aliexpress.

Currently I own no San Martins but I may purchase the Chrono I pictured above.

Yep. Owned one of the first Phoibos models. They have invested and steadily upped their game. Their QC and CS is outstanding. SM could learn from them.