CELEBRATION: 1,000,000 Page Views!

Hello everyone, just a quick post today to say a big THANK YOU to everyone who visits my blog and who has helped me to reach ONE MILLION views. Now if you only ever visit the blog on a phone (and I know a lot of you do) then you will never have seen the view counter because it's only visible on a computer. In fact there's quite a bit of the blog that is only easily visible on a computer... and I'm still working on ways to make the 'mobile' experience better - but the fact is that 'Blogger' was designed to be looked at on a computer, so it's never going to be as good on a phone.

Now regular readers may be thinking to yourself 'But wasn't it only a few months ago that the blog hit 750,000 views?' and indeed you would be right... as you can see from the graph below over the last year the views have really taken off and stayed strong (average 1000-1500 a day), which is pretty amazing if you ask me, considering that I only talk about one watch brand most of the time. 

The KITH thing seemed to coincide with a boost, I guess it just created a lot of interest in the brand in general - but if it was KITH specific then I would have expected it to fall off dramatically. This doesn't seem to be the case, and while July was down on the previous two months (I'm guessing due to holidays) it still represents a very strong level of engagement. 

So clearly I am doing 'something' right and I would hope that my readers appreciate my honesty and integrity and above all my sarcastic sense of humour. Yes I rip the piss out of the Swiss fairly relentlessly but after nine years fully immersed in the hobby it's hard not to. It's not just TAG Heuer either, they're all as bad as each other with their 'back stories' and general nonsense. Honestly I really don't care much beyond 'do I like the watch in front of me'.  

But okay, I get that the Swiss need some kind of marketing angle to persuade us to part with what is actually an insane amount of money for their products... I mean quite how I got to the point of being willing to spend literally tens of thousands of pounds on watches when I won't pay more than about £70 for a pair of trainers is beyond me, but when I hear things like the Instagram story behind the 'Sparks' Monaco then I can't help but roll my eyes and snort into my tea cup. 

I just wish the Swiss could stop endlessly recycling the past and focus on the future. I get that 'history' is important as it's one of the 'justifications' for the elevated cost, but when I look back at the 1990s catalogues I think how exciting it must have been to have been in the hobby then, with original and creative watch designs and not this endless cycle of rehashed dials, heritage re-issues and tenuous 'tributes to' culminating in the inevitable 'panda' before a slight refresh and the whole thing starting again. But okay, I accept I'm probably in the minority as far as the 'watch community' goes...

So as I say, things are going well; but I can't take all the credit, the esteemed 'Council of Considered Opinion' has proven itself a valuable resource, often pointing out things in their comments that I might otherwise have missed and letting us know about region specific limited editions that we may otherwise never have known about (the COCO comprises 28 members from countries as far afield as the US, Japan, Sweden and Spain don't you know!) - so I must applaud and thank them for their continued hard work and diligence! 

Finally I must single out my good friend and occasional contributor 'Jim Dollares', who makes me laugh daily and gives me a useful window to the world beyond TAG Heuer because unlike me he actually looks at and cares about other watch brands. Like... 'Longines', whatever that is. Jim is also an ambassador for wearing watches and experiencing them to the max, something I am guilty of failing at - though I must admit with his relentless encouragement I am getting better at doing.

He also writes great posts now and again, you should read them!

Okay well that's all I wanted to say really... and soon I shall reveal the watch I bought to celebrate this truly momentous occasion. Some of you already know what it is, but for those that don't it is something quite special and suitably expensive to boot! 🥳

Toodle pip. 

Aqua-G