VERY IMPORTANT UPDATE - September 6
over 2 years ago
– Tue, Sep 07, 2021 at 06:51:12 PM
Please read this update in it's entirety, especially if you ordered a green watch.
Well, I have good news, and I have not great news. Let's start with the good.
The watches arrived, and for the most part, they look fantastic. The new thicker, shorter lugs make a huge difference to the overall visual weight and balance of the watch. The nato straps are AWESOME. Seriously, they're super cool and I love how the stripes line up perfectly with the stripes on the dial. I've been busy checking each watch and packing up boxes. I've got about 50 boxes already that just need closing up and the shipping label to be printed and attached. I'm very happy about all of this!
I will be shooting to get everything packed up and ready to ship over the next few days. Once I have sent them off, you will receive an email via backerkit with tracking information.
Now the not great news.
And I'll give you just a little background. When I was first going through the initial prototype process, we started with a darker green dial. When the first dial was created, we decided that the green needed to be lighter so that it reads better as green. We changed it and lightened it up. This was the green color that ended up being used in the prototypes, and all of the marketing photos/videos that were a part of the kickstarter campaign. I was happy with this color!
Fast forward 10 months. Remember about a month ago I sent an update that talked about how we hit our first hiccup and the hour markers were just a little off on the green dials? We obviously weren't okay with that and the green dials were remade.
The misaligned markers issue was resolved, however when I opened up the box of watches today I immediately realized that the green color was darker than the prototype. For some reason, when the dials were remade, they reverted to the original, darker green. I will hold my hands up and say that when I looked at the photos of the fixed hour markers, I didn't notice the darker green. The color on the dials changes pretty dramatically in the light, so I figured it was just the photo. And my focus was on the hour markers because the green color was already locked in.
So here we are. I have something like 150 green watches that are darker than they are supposed to be. I've talked to the manufacturers, who are as upset as I am about it, and are willing to fix them all. The problem is that it will take anywhere from 40-50 days (and I've learned to expect on the later end of the estimation).
Now, I will say that these darker green watches do not look bad. They are simply darker. A quick glance at it, and it looks black. A closer look, and you will see the green. And get it in the right light and it certainly looks green. It is actually truer to British Racing Green, which is a very deep, dark green. I simply wanted the green version to be more noticeably green, so we pushed the brightness. In some lights, it's a barely noticeable difference, but in other lights, it is quite noticeable.
So this is what I want to do:
I want to give you the choice. If you ordered a green watch, then you can choose to either accept the dark green version and I will ship it now. Or you can wait 1.5 to 2 months and the new green version will be ready.
I can't send you the dark version now, and then replace it with the lighter green version later. I need to send the watch cases back to the manufacturer to swap the dials. So if you choose the darker version now, then that's the one you keep.
If you ordered multiple watches, and at least one of them is green, this all applies to you, too. We are happy to send you the rest of your order now, and follow up with the greens later if you would prefer the lighter version.
I'm going to put a bunch of different images and videos of different lighting conditions at the bottom of this update to help you make your choice.
Want to switch to a different color instead of green? This is a maybe. I cannot offer Red for this, as I only made enough for those that ordered them during the kickstarter. I do have some extra stock of blue and black colors available, but not much.
I need to know your response as soon as possible. I will give everybody 3 days to make a decision. Please either send me a message, or comment directly on this update and I will see it and respond. If I don't hear from you within the 3 days, I will assume that you want to wait for the fixed green color.
Finally
I'm so sorry. My stomach dropped when I realized the mistake. I know that you've all been waiting a long time for these watches already, and this is such lame news. I'm happy with all of the other watches, but truly gutted that it's not perfect for all of you. I'm not some mega company like Seiko, where they would just ship these as is and be totally fine. It's literally just me (and my super supportive family), and these watches have been a massive passion project for me, so it really hurts me at a personal level that it's not right.
Okay, I'll stop blabbing now. Here are a bunch of photos and videos showing the green watch in different lighting. On every one of these, the prototype is on the left, and the newer, darker version is on the right. Please leave me a comment if there's something specific you want to see.
^ You can really see in the videos above how the lighting conditions play a huge part. In the first one, i have a light shining directly down on the watches, so it's making the colors pop. While the second video is with terrible lighting, and they both almost look black. Generally, it will most often be somewhere in the middle.
Last little note: The date window on the new models is not misaligned, as it looks in a lot of these photos. The time is about to roll over to a new day, and the date window is in the process of flipping over to the next date. This is normal behavior for movements like this.
