Customer Reviews

Manufacturing Time: Global Competition in the Watch Industry, 1795-2000

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Any of us who love horology and want to learn more will be very disappointed by this book.

It is very broadly based with virtually no supporting technical detail and numerous techical errors.

For example it states that a pin lever watch has fewer moving parts than a jeweled lever...

She freqeuently refered to Landes book but he in addition to being a respected academic is an enthusuastic collector.

...This book has no grabbing technical detail, not even enough to justify the sweeping economic statements she makes.

To her credit she pointed out some trends and aspects of national markets I had not understood but it is tough going even for someone already deeply interested in this subject.

Excellent book if you are interested in the economic history of the watch industry over the last 200 years. I found it informative and readable.

Related to the authors previous work, Manufacturing Time reviews economic history and regional development for an industry with over 300 years of change.

The book focuses on shifting supplier trends in the last two centuries of consumer watch making, an obviously mature industry that will continue in some form. Various nations have fared well while they have held some technical or popular advantage, but have had trouble responding to industry internal and external forces that change the game. The book explores how players, who were once swift and strong winners, become slow and ponderous losers, dragging down entire economic communities. Demonstrated life cycles within watch manufacturing are instructive regarding general business management, industrial organization and policy.

This book excels at explaining, in detail, how watchmaking regions rise, fall and, sometimes, rise again.

I found the book valuable for its historical background and insight into how new ideas in the watch world were or were not adopted and the resulting implications for that region/nation.

It also dispels myths. For example, I was surprised to learn how the Swiss watch industry was really "saved" in the 1980s. In every other article/book I've read, the same old story is told. You know, the Swiss were saved by the efforts of a single, brilliant person. Glasmeier's version is more plausible.

Anyone wanting to learn about technical differences in watch movements, well, this is not the book for you.

If you're a fan of commerce and always wondered about the history behind that watch on your wrist, this is one good book to read.

In my opinion, one of the better business books out there.