WatchTime at 15: A Growing Audience of 600,000

This year WatchTime celebrates its 15th anniversary. What started as a small watch magazine in 1999 has become what some regard as the world’s best watch magazine. One of those is Sidin Vadakut, a journalist with Mint, a leading business newspaper in India, who has no connection to WatchTime other than as a reader. In 2012, he wrote in Mint: “For more than a decade, Joe Thompson and his team have produced arguably the most influential watch magazine in the world. With an unmatched reputation for editorial independence, WatchTime is where connoisseurs and collectors go for an honest, educated opinion.” Today we are making WatchTime’s world-renowned independence and expertise the centerpiece of one of the world’s leading media platforms for watch collectors. We’re not just a magazine anymore. It is a testament to the great work of our editorial team that WatchTime has skillfully mastered the transformation from a small print publication to a large multi-channel media brand. That team is led by Editor-in-Chief Joe Thompson, who has 37 years’ experience covering the watch world. Behind the magazine you hold in your hands now stands a wide range of editorial products that together reach more than 600,000 readers every month. As publisher of WatchTime, I am extremely proud of what our team has accomplished. Here’s why:

• WatchTime sells more print copies than any competitor by far.
• WatchTime has more subscribers than any competitor by far.
• WatchTime’s per-issue sales and subscriptions of our tablet edition are among the highest in the world.
• WatchTime.com has the most social media followers of any American watch magazine.
• WatchTime.com has one of the world’s highest timepiece-newsletter subscriber bases.
• WatchTime.com is one of the world’s fastest-growing watch websites.
• WatchTime hosts America’s leading events for watch collectors, Inside Basel.Geneva, in conjunction with our partner Jeff Kingston.

At a time when many magazines, including watch magazines, are declining, WatchTime has dramatically increased its audience thanks to initiatives we’ve made in digital publishing. Since 2011, the number of visitors to our website has grown by 700 percent; our digital subscriber base by 800 percent and our newsletters by more than 900 percent. For this rapid growth WatchTime has been honored with a record-breaking array of awards and nominations, among them seven Digital Magazine Awards nominations and two Folio Fame Awards. The result is that today WatchTime reaches a diverse array of watch collectors: our social media audience is on average 29 years old; our website audience is 38 years old on average. Readers of the digitally enhanced tablet edition of the magazine are on average 45 years old and the average age of our print magazine readers is 54 years. One of the most interesting facts about our digital readership is that almost 50 percent of our website visitors go to WatchTime.com on their cellphones. Lastly, while in 1999 there was only one edition of WatchTime, we now publish editions in South America, the Middle East and India as well as in the USA. Finally, dear readers, I want to thank you for all the support you have given us over the years. We are excited about all the opportunities that are unfolding for us in the new multi-platform media world. We look forward to serving you for many more years in many more ways. Dominik Grau Publisher