My Affinity for Watches, and GQ Magazine

 

Recently I was flying from Frankfurt to Denver (a long flight) and was seeking a means of passing time when I came across a German GQ magazine in the front seat pocket.  Now I couldn’t read a word of it but since GQ magazine is about 75% advertisements I could still get some presumed value from flipping through the pages.  I was interested in seeing how similar or different the German version of GQ is from the US and British versions, both of whom I have purchased and read in the past – yes, this is a bit of a confession.

 

Well, much to my satisfaction I almost immediately stumbled upon ad after ad for watches!  Sure, there was the Rolex ad followed by the Omega ad and yes even a Bell & Ross ad which is what timepiece I happened to have on my wrist while perusing.  So after about 15 pages and 7 watch ads I figured I would count just exactly how many watch ads were in the 190 pages of the magazine. 

Venture a guess?  Now these are full page watch ads, partial pages consumed by watch ads not included.  Ok, got your guess? 

Thirty Nine!  The number surprised even me.  20.53% of ALL the pages (not advertising pages) were dedicated solely to advertising only one type of product – watches.  Now I know that globally there is almost no men’s jewelry that is universally accepted.  Gold chains, nope. Rings (regardless of which finger they occupy) no again.  Ankle or wrist bracelets, earrings, naval pierces?  Again, all NO. 

But watches?  YES!!!

Yet still, it is only acceptable to wear one watch at a time so that thought of having that much ink in a men’s fashion magazine dedicated to watches was both surprising and impressive.  Impressive because I quite fancy watches, all kinds.  Even German ones.  I don’t have one but I’m not going to rule out buying one in the future. 

A small observation that I thought the extensive followership of this blog might appreciate – all three or four of you!