SeaVulture
Join Date: Feb 2010 Location: San Antonio, Texas Posts: 1,786 Real Name: William
Senior Member Super Geek
Swiss Movement, Any Questions?
I've seen several threads posted here, in the last day or two, with the obvious design of posing some kind of dark plot to fool the consumer as to the veracity of the terms "Swiss Made" or "Swiss" as applied to the products of certain manufacturers. As I am not one of those who see dark visions in every corner, I chose to do a little searching. Here is a letter that was a reply from a member of the Swiss Federation: Swiss Made and Swiss Movements reply from Swiss Federation In another thread we were discussing where SWISS or SWISS MADE could be located as well as SWISS MOVEMENT versus SWISS MOVT. Since that thread was locked, I'm following up by posting the answer I received from the Swiss Federation in the spirit of learning and sharing information about our passion of watch collecting. I received the following reply from the federation verbatim: (the good stuff is at the bottom) We acknowledge receipt of your email of the 23rd January 2009 and thank you for it. As you may know, the Federation of the Swiss watch industry (FH),is the Swiss watch industry's leading trade association. We are a private, professional, and nonprofit association, currently bringing together more than 500 members representing around 90% of all Swiss watch manufacturers (finished products, watch movements, components,...). We have, among others, as our mission to contribute to the development of the Swiss watch industry. An important part of this task is ensured trough the protection of Swiss names when used in connection with watches and other horological products. In order to protect Swiss names, the Swiss Government has enacted the Ordinance governing the use of the name "Swiss" or "Switzerland" for watches (please see under http://www.fhs.ch/doc/osme.pdf) which gives the criteria must be met for a watch to be considered as Swiss and to be allowed to bear Swiss indications. The FH's membership is not determining.