In our previous ‘A moment with‘, we interviewed the founder of Havaan Tuvali watches. We learnt a lot about what it takes to start a microwatch brand and also the successes. Now we are back with another interview and this time it is with Phoibos Watches founder.

Phoibos Watches

We will not got too much into the detail of the story of the watch as we have our review of Phoibos Watches Reef Master coming very soon.

Who is Phoibos watches?

We are Ethan Guo and Emily Feng. I am 34-year-old while Emily Feng is 32 years old.  We got married at 2012, and 2013 we have a baby. We like to travel and in 2014 we travelled to Greece. We were attracted by its rich history and beautiful landscape. We found many brands got their name from Greece, such as Omega, Nike, OLYMPUS etc. So we thought of a brand name from Greece to suit for global market.After one year of learning and researching, we got brand name PHOIBOS from Ancient Greek Mythology. It is the name of the God of light and sun.

The meaning of PHOIBOS is “Bright, Shining One”. We think it is a good name.The total number of watches produced annually by the Chinese( China and Hong Kong) watch industry is estimated to be around 1.2 billion units, with a large number of those being OEM production for other international brands.  Public’s opinion of “Chinese Made”is low quality, but we found it is not all. We found that many watch manufacturers with high quality produce level, supply OEM and ODM watch to many brands. We also found these brands set their price 5-6 times more than the cost of production.

So our aim was to create a watch brand with an entry-level price but with greater quality. This is where Phoibos Watches was born.

What makes Phoibos watches excellent diver watches?

1. We try to design watches which customer like.

2. We use reliable manufacturer at Hong Kong. They also produce many famous microbrand watches. With their skill and experience, our watch have good quality control.

3, We set a very reasonable price. And ship locally, fast and no duty issue.

4. We offer one year warranty of quartz watch, and 2 years warranty of automatic watch, we now have a watch service center at www.yelp.com  and we have No.1 highest customer feedback.

How did you think of the design of the watches?

1. We think designers need know the market need. For example our project watch Sentinel , at first we designed it with camouflage dial, after we posted it on Facebook “phoibos watch owners club”, 90% members don’t like the camouflage dial, so we changed it. For micro brand watches to be better, feedback from customers is vital, before you release the watch, this will save lot of error cost.

2. Brave to think and try, combined the idea in the watch, show elements in the watch differently.

3. Balance the watch with the perfect part size: case dial, lug to lug, hands size etc.

4. Use right material on each watch, for different watches, choose different materials.

What was the most difficult step when starting Phoibos Watches?

For a China Brand, the most difficult thing is; many customers have the opinion of “China Made” is low quality, but we think when we released several models, and customers believed the quality of our watches, they changed their mind.

Secondly is finding high quality manufacturer. There are 1000-2000 watch manufacturers in China and Hong Kong, but finding the right and reliable manufacturer is difficult and takes time.

What was your most successful day at Phoibos Watches?

We can’t define the most successful day. We try release 3-4 new models per year, if customer like the design and are satisfied with the quality along with the reasonable price, we define that as success.

What can we expect from Phoibos Watches in the future?

At first we do some homage watches, but in future we will create original design watch. We will try combined Chinese elements with the watch design, but with a global aesthetic. For now we need to finish the design. So keep it a secret and wait until next year.

Maybe in the future we will do a dress watch, it all depends on the market.

We hoped you have enjoyed our latest ‘A moment with’ segment. Do look out for the review coming very soon.

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