Happy Holidays!

[THIS POST HAS BEEN EDITED.  I WAS MISLEAD ABOUT THE NATURE OF THIS WATCH.  IT IS NOT AN AUTOMATIC.  IT IS NOT A WIND-UP.  IT IS A QUARTZ WATCH WITH DECORATIVE MECHANISMS.  But, it is still beautiful . . . ]

I hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas and Happy New Year!  I'll preview one of the new watches that I got for Christmas.  It's a new Elgin Automatic Watch with a partially skeletonized front and exhibition caseback.  It's sold at Sears and is very affordable compared to many watches on the market today.
 

 The Christmas Card in the background is a very nice one from Hallmark sent by my Aunt and Uncle.  It certainly sets a nice Christmas tone.  Have a wonderful Holiday!

Introducing the Modify Watches Mini!

A Modify watch

An upstart watch company called Modify Watches contacted me and offered to send me a free watch.  Since free is good, a couple of e-mails led to the arrival of this very cool watch and two interchangeable bands last week. 

The watch pictured is the Modify Mini.  The watch face is an inexpensive, self-contained, unit with a Japanese movement that can easily be removed from the band and placed into another band.  The bands are made of a very comfortable velvety rubber and come any many hip colors.  If you stretch the band, you can pop the watch face out and put it into another watch.  Changing the look of a Modify Watch is much, much, easier than conventional watch bands. 

The collection comes in two sizes - Mini and Classic.  If you check out the Modify Watches website, you might wonder how big the watches are.  The Mini is about the size of a regular wrist watch and the Classic is a big watch that would make any hip-hop artist proud.  The classic would probably look great with a Flavor Flav style alarm clock around your neck!  Indeed, the company describes all of these watches as "Dope!"  Here is my Mini pictured with a considerably more uptight Timex Weekender for comparison purposes.  The second Modify watch band is underneath the two watches.

A Timex Weekender and a Modify Watch side-by-side for comparison

Modify Watches offers a fresh approach to the wrist watch.  It would be very easy to develop a collection of expressive interchangeable faces and colorful bands.  At this writing, there are 12 Mini Watch faces and 13 band colors.  The watch faces start at only $25 and the watch bands start at only $15.  These fun watches won't break a tight budget and won't be mugger bait if you are out at night.

[As of 2024, it looks like the Modify Watches brand has been bought out by Custom Ink and it has certainly been deemphasized on their website.]

A New Relic Watch

If you are looking for nice quartz watches that are good values for the price, check out Fossil's Relic brand watches.  They sell at department stores like JC Penney and Kohls. I like this Relic brand watch because it has a simple and readable face and the flat stainless steel finish.  This model is called the Relic Detroit.

A Relic Detroit Watch

Overall, Relic offers a very good value for the money.  There are a wide variety of Relic-brand watches available here on Amazon.

A Nice Instrument Panel Watch for the Masses

I know I said I'd make a million dollars and buy a Bell & Ross watch, but in the meantime I found this Structure watch from Sears.  Pretty cool and priced for the rest of us.

A Structure Instrument Panel Watch from Sears

Of course, if you've got style and class, you could spring for a real Bell & Ross watch:

A Cool Structure Brand Watch from Sears

You might be surprised, but Sears has a great selection of affordable watches.  Structure watches are only $29.99 and look very, very good.  This ana-digital watch makes an affordable Christmas gift and looks great.

 This watch is also available in black and red.  Structure watches tend to be "on trend" and sometimes draw inspiration from well known watches.  I love this $30 alternative to Bell & Ross.

This Structure watch had a periscope or artificial horizon theme, but had a strange case and a white strap so I returned it.  It was an innovative design.

I simply prefer classic designs most of the time.  For example, this watch captures the timeless elements of a great dive watch.

Finally, I recently added this cool diver-style watch from Structure to my collection.  It's not Russian and it's not a dive watch.  But, it looks cool!

Check out my full review of this watch here:

Wristwatch Review:  Structure Analog Diver-Style Watch

Sometimes it's not the brand ... a watch I won!

Sometimes it's not the brand that makes a watch cool.  Sometimes, it's the circumstances that brought you the watch that make a watch cool.  For example, I recently got this Riviera-brand Women's Quartz Watch.  Sure, it's cheap and it's made in China.

But, this watch is very cool because I won it at Dave & Busters.  It was in a "Claw Machine" and I grabbed it on my very first try.

It's the first time I've ever managed to win something with a claw machine.  With three gripper claws, I'm pretty sure that the odds were stacked against me.

I wonder if my wife will wear it with pride once I replace the band with one that actually fits?  This cheap little watch is definitely one of the coolest in our house now.  Why?  Because it represents -  Victory!

Watch Gift Ideas for Black Friday

Happy Thanksgiving!  Now that everyone is stuffed from Thanksgiving Dinner, it's time to make plans for the biggest shopping day of the year.  Black Friday is when Americans beat down the doors of their local big box retailers and start buying Christmas gifts with gusto.  Naturally, wrist watches make fine gifts!

If you are thinking about shopping online, I invite you to check out some of the advertisements on this blog:  Bulova Box, Casio Corner, Timex Timeout, and the Watch Slides.  I've built these areas with links to good affordable watches from Amazon a respected retailer.  Except for the Bulovas and some of the watches in the slides, I own many of these watches and you may find my reviews in links from this blog.

If you are looking to save money this Christmas, check out this article on watches that fit low budgets:

Seven Great Men's Watches for Less Than $30 

Watches at Walmart - circa 2011

Good luck and Happy Watch Hunting!

[Even returning to this post in 2024, I'm glad to say that Walmart still has plenty of interesting looking cheap watches.  Most of them are still priced below $20.00.  If you pop over to Amazon, this link has a search for men's watches under $30.  You'll find plenty of names like Casio, Armitron, and Timex with watches in that range.  Many Chinese brands offer additional watches for less as well.  The hunt continues.]