In the last few years sales of adult watches have enjoyed a remarkable turnaround considering the lull in sales in the previous decade. Mainly because of mobile phones, many people simply decided that having a watch on their wrist was an unwanted extra and having the time on hand via their mobile phone also meant that wearing a watch was no longer a necessity.
However in the case of kids watches sales continued to grow through this period - simply because most kids under the age of 12 did not own mobile phones.
The resurgence in the demand for adult wristwatches was mainly due to the fashion and designer element as people began to see watches as more of a fashion accessory or designer label statement rather than as a timepiece, then as a newer generation of people began wearing watches a small percentage of those people also began to understand them more and look into more exclusive options such as luxury and precision watches.
The kids watch market however is built on watch manufacturers providing cheap functional quartz watches, mostly made from plastic or PVC and often coming in bright and vivid colours with no features or special functions and with very little fashion elements. The kids watch market is dominated by big brands such as Timex and Sekonda, while brands like Casio, Adidas and Tikkers also have a small range of watches for children available, however nearly all of the big luxury and designer watch brands do not cater for children in their watch ranges.
The reason why designer and luxury kids watches are not common is simply because of lack of demand. What boys and girls look for in a watch is completely different to what an adult looks for. Most children would select a watch not based upon the design, brand, precision or mechanism but simply because of the colour, images, graphics and character portrayal, with the majority of kids watches sold having some kind of character emblazoned on the watch. Characters watches from Disney are among the best selling kids watches in this genre with Hello Kitty being the favourite amongst girls and Ben10 for boys but also other watches with characters mostly generated from childrens TV programs account for a large percentage of this market such as Peppa Pig, Thomas The Tank Engine, Dora The Explorer, Spongebob Squarepants and Toy Story.
In the case of childrens watches, as sales of adult watches continues to grow, sales of kids watches are in steady decline and research shows that this could be possibly due to the fact that kids are owning mobile phones at younger and younger ages, however the effect of this has shown that the ability in children to simply telling the time via an analogue clock using hands and fingers is on the decline due to nearly all mobile phones using a digital display.
Paul Williams is an expert in the retail watch sector and currently works for Watches2u, one of the largest UK retailers of Watches with over 70 watch brands including both adult and Kids Watches.