Is your luxury watch counterfeit?

Fusion Timepieces in no way promotes or condones purchasing or selling a counterfeit watch. As individuals who appreciate the unique quality and provenance of a genuine timepiece, we would not support a product from the counterfeit watch market.

To begin, the terms used to indicate a fake watch include counterfeit, forgery, copy, knockoff, clone, replica or fake, and are one and the same. A counterfeit watch is one that is produced as a copy of a popular brand in an effort to trick buyers into believing the timepiece was produced by a specific maker. The counterfeit market is a multi-million dollar illegal business. Imitation or counterfeit watches have been circulating since the late 1700's and continue to this day. It is estimated that tens of millions of modern counterfeit timepieces are circulating the market in the U.S alone, and this number is believed to be increasing. There is however a category of legal imitation watches that needs to be differentiated from counterfeit or clone watches.

A homage watch is one whose design mimics certain qualities and appears similar to an existing timepiece. It pays homage to a popular brand in an attempt to increase its popularity and sales. Homage watches are not counterfeit when the brand producing it is printing their name on the dial instead of the brand's name they are imitating.

To me homage watches are unoriginal, unethical, and a lazy attempt at gaining sales. However, many well known quality brands copy each other. In fact, almost every watch brand today is copying some aspects of another brand, or classics from the past. Imitating an idea or style is not illegal and every industry is ripe with imitations.

As far back as the 1700s, well known English timepieces were faked by Dutch watchmakers and introduced into the market. Watches during this era were expensive luxury items generally reserved for the wealthy. The counterfeit business expanded quickly and spread throughout Europe. The Dutch forgeries were low-quality inelegant alternatives, and could not match the precision and craftsmanship of the originals. Despite their poor quality, these fake watches were popular among the masses who couldn't afford the real timepiece.

  What made counterfeit watches popular was production was quicker and cheaper than their authentic English competitors. The early forgers intentionally misspelled names on their dials in an attempt to mimic the original maker's name and trick the consumer. Ironically, if the forged timepiece printed their own name on their dial, instead of the name of the brand being copied, it wouldn't have been counterfeit.

Currently, many major luxury watch brands are predominantly counterfeited in China and advertised to the market as replicas. The direct retail consumer is aware the watch is a copy of a well known brand. These watches are illegal to manufacture, sell at retail, and to introduce into the secondhand market. In the counterfeit market, the consumer is offered varying levels of quality fakes. The higher the price, the higher the quality and more convincing the clone watch. Prices extend into the thousands, but still a fraction of the price of the authentic watch.

Counterfeit watches can be made with premium materials and are crafted to replicate the original design down to the finest details, including materials, movements and functions.

Over the years, clone watches have become increasingly sophisticated, with many replicas being virtually indistinguishable from the original. While they may not have the quality or durability as the genuine article, clone watches remain popular for those individuals willing to misrepresent themselves in order to impress others. However, we strongly advise against purchasing counterfeit watches as they are illegal and unethical. We encourage our customers to always choose authenticity. A virtuous watch connoisseur would not wear a counterfeit watch.

The watches in our online store cannot be cloned as each of our timepieces are authentic, serialized and possess history records from the previous century. There is no confusion that our website only sells genuine and authentic timepieces.