Watches and Writing · 2:31pm Mar 21st, 2017
It's a beautiful spring morning, and I'm catching up on watch work. Which is to say I'm working with a smile on my face.
http://i.imgur.com/vNtSEEb.jpg
But enough about how I need to clean my bench. I wanted to ask your opinion on something.
Once I get my backlog caught up, I'm going to bring a few old antiques in my parts-bin back to life so they can go up on ebay. While I'm at it, do you think MLP themed antique pocket watches would sell? These aren't collector's items by any means, so I don't feel bad about altering them. I could make special hands, paint/enamel the dial, maybe engrave the case. That represents a lot of work. I'd need north of $300 to make it worth my time. What do you think? Big-ticket items still selling in the fandom?
As for writing. I feel a busy streak coming on. I have 3~4 stories in the fire right now: A new chapter of House that is already coming MUCH faster than the last one. A colab with Exelzior on a new clop, (we wrote Three Heats one Flame together). And a 3-4 chapter PG-13 sequel to Filling a Hole in the Sun.
Have fun out there!
You can try selling them, there's no harm in trying. How many watches dl you have? Maybe some people would take them without any work done on them.
4465922
Dozens, lol.
I've got a pretty good system down for buying broken watches, fixing them, and flipping them for a little profit. The question is, if the extra work of making a pony themed watch will pay off. I could make a watch with Celestia and Luna moon/sun complication, but that's not a small amount of work or skill.
This is interesting so I'll go very in depth on speculation (I'm very interested in collector's items and fan works, this will be based on what I've observed). Sorry if this sounds rambly, I'm very tired.
Anyways, first off, before even considering whether or not it will work, some details are needed. The main ones are the value (and specifications) of the original watches, what kind of watches they are (it seems to be all mechanical pocket watches from the picture, though the blog post doesn't make it too clear), selling method (template or commission), and most importantly, an example of the finished product (whether physical, a sketch, or a very detailed description doesn't matter right now).
From what I've noticed, the magic number seems to be $250 for products like these. I can only remember one off the top of my head that was $300 (a Bioshock watch, if I remember correctly) and it had trouble selling out. There are items that are $400+, but unless it's a licensed individually numbered item, don't bother (this is only talking about small items like watches and figures, not considering resale prices).
Now we get to the tricky part. These aren't licensed, so they aren't heavy collectibles. On the other hand, they are custom and made by a fan, so that boosts their value in another way (people are willing to buy a Mega Man E-Tank mug for $40 plus shipping, plus there's all of the commissioned art), but makes it riskier (the market is much shakier when you break $99). The trick is that this is MLP, which lacks high end licensed collectible items, and has people willing to buy physical editions of fan fics for over $120, along with other fan base high end items, so I'd say getting the idea out there is worth it, but definitely gauge reactions before committing.
Now for actually selling them, I'd recommend going the commission route and creating a general price table, but selling based on how much the person wants. For example, if I were to buy one (unfortunately short on money at the moment), I would want something like Sunset's cutie mark engraved on the face for a regular watch or the mark on the outside and a phoenix outline on the face for a pocket watch. Someone else may just want a picture of Twilight slapped on, or another the Discord watch (the one that had Discord as a center piece and has arms as the hands), or the story book image from episode one engraved with the hands tipped with the alicorns and in full color. If you'd rather go the template route, I'd say sketch up a bunch of designs and toss up a straw poll.
This idea has potential, just remember details are important. When some people hear watch, they think ten dollar battery watch from Walmart, some think expensive brand name watches, and some think complex skeleton watches, so early clarification is important. Posting a lot of information about the watch itself and the process also helps immensely, as it helps people who know what you're talking about feel confident in the purchase (getting detailed reviews is a huge boost) and seems fancy and more worthwhile to those who know nothing about the subject. It also helps curb crazy expectations, so hopefully no one will expect a skeleton Swiss watch with a three dimensional replica of Canterlot Castle with a bunch of little ponies moving about, then trashing the entire thing for not getting that (early negative reviews are very painful).
I'd say it's a bit risky, but definitely worth a shot.
4465929
glhf dude