Originally Posted by
Ray
Can't speak for others, but that's the way it worked for me. My own watch odyssey took me from the micro-brands (e.g. Benarus, Steinhart) through the likes of Breitling and Rolex. The more knowledgeable I became as a collector, the more I came to appreciate the value proposition of Seiko the logic and good sense of having a Seiko or two in my collection became inescapable.
Not to say Seiko is without fault. Sometimes their design choices are confounding, and their "all things to all people" business model guarantees they sell some junk no serious collector will touch. But in the category of low- to mid-range automatics like most of the watches you see posted here, they're hard to beat. And at the higher end, it's arguable that Grand Seikos are a better built and better value alternative to Rolex.