When selling watches, have them all set to the right time

On being prepared for opportunity

Last week I sat down with my phone in my back pocket. I cracked the glass over one of the camera lenses. I had to get it fixed.

I’m not a huge phone guy.

I don’t keep social media apps on my phone. I’ll install them for a while to check ads and then I remove them again.

Apple Notes, Google Maps and Spotify are the apps I open most. My phone screen time is often well under an hour a day.

And so I never feel the need to have the latest phone. I’ve bought my last few phones, refurbished from Swappie. I think it’s a great company.

But I still want my phone to work.

I hate when things don’t work and I hate having to connect different systems together. I think this is left over trauma from previously owning loads of old synths and music equipment. From the pain of trying to get them all to operate together.

So I only buy iPhones because they easily connect to my two MacBooks.

I guess this is all a long way of saying I have an iPhone 13. Lol.

Still, I had to get the camera fixed.

I brought the phone to a small repair shop in Marseille just behind the Vieux-Port. The guy told me he could fix it “no problem.” It would take an hour and cost 39 euros.

Perfect.

Except, after I walked out of the shop, I realised I had no way to tell the time and no cash to buy anything.

I don’t normally bring a bank card around with me. I take out a little cash each week for coffees and other small purchases where shops in France won’t accept card. For everything else I use Apple Pay.

It’s early July and it was hot, bright and sunny.

I found a little square with trees and some benches and sat down and zoned out for a while. I read a little of a French novel, going over some of the parts I had translated the last few days. I watched some guys teaching a group of kids how to do Parkour.

After what felt like 30-40 minutes I got up and started walking back to the store.

I made my way through some of the shopping streets in centre ville Marseille. I spotted a shop selling watches. Great, I can check the time.

However, when I got to the window, every watch facing the street on display was at a different time.

Maybe if you’re into watches you can tell me this is normal. But it seemed crazy to me. Why try and sell a watch that’s not set to the right time!

I walked off confused.

Two minutes later I saw a Swatch shop on the other side of the street. I crossed over to check. Every watch facing the street on display was at the same time. The right time.

Ok, some people may laugh at Swatch as a brand. But compared to the other watch seller it was obvious which one was more ready to make a sale.

And this got me thinking.

Just that morning I had decided to make myself look more professional for my copywriting. I’d bought a domain, set it up with a paid Google Workspace account and added this Substack to the domain.

I was glad I was more like the Swatch shop. I was ready for an opportunity that might walk past me.

And I also knew I had ten minutes to get back to pick up my phone.