Lange 31: A view on its commercial achievements

The Lange 31 is a unique and very interesting watch, but have not really enjoyed popularity. Why?

I have covered this watch during the launch event in Dresden in 2007. See Lange 31 - more complicated than meets the eye.

As is apparent in the article above, I am rather impressed with the technical prowress of this watch. So it is with great interest that I follow the commercial progress of the Lange 31. Unfortunately I find the watch not to be very popular, commerically.

I am not entirely sure why not, but can offer that perhaps the very large size of the watch, and the plain-ness of the dial, looking very discrete, not calling attention to itself as reasons. Yet hidden within, is the incredible technical achievements packed into the rather large and thick case.

But history has shown us in the past that models from the great houses which were not commercially successful at launch and production years are the ones which manage to achieve impressive results in auctions years on. One example is the Rolex Daytona, another is the Patek Philippe Amagnetic. At launch, they were poor commercial performers, but when disconnected (I refer to the first series of Daytonas, as later generations are extremely popular) proved to be highly sought after and achieving very high auction results.

Perhaps the Lange 31 might be one of those as well. For me, a key BUY recommendation.