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Based out of Tokyo, Japan. Citizen are a publicly-traded company which is traded on the Japanese stock exchange. Citizen were originally a small electronics company. Relatively unrecognizable compared to the large multi-national company they are today. The brand still produces small electronic products such as calculators, but is best known for its global watch brand “Citizen”.
Although the company was founded in the 1930s, it really began to take off after the quartz crisis. This event allowed Japanese watchmakers to truly compete on a level playing field against their European counterparts. Before this event, it was extremely difficult to sell watches to a normal man. When the world was using purely mechanical watches, timepieces were only worn by people with large disposable incomes.
Other notable watch brands owned by Citizen are Bulova and Frederique Constant. Whilst none of these brands are extremely high-end luxury watches. The three brands do not crossover with one another and allow Citizen to market their watches to different buyers within the watch market.
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Do Citizen Watches Hold Their Value?
If you regularly buy watches, this is always something that crosses your mind. Perhaps in 9 months you will find a new watch you want to buy and wish to sell your old one. Citizen watches hold their value fairly well. Whilst you will lose money on almost all watches (except high end & limited edition). Citizen is certainly no worse than any other watch brand.
You can expect to lose a good 30-40% from brand new retail, compared to selling your preowned Citizen. The good news is that the more expensive your original purchase was, the lower percentage you should lose when selling. The reason for this is that Citizen models such as Skyhawks & Navihawks still have very good resale value. In addition to this, Citizen watches come with a 3 or 5 year guarantee which will boost their resale potential if required.
How Long Do Citizen Watches Last?
You may have already guessed that Citizen watches last a long time due to their guarantee. You may have heard the generalization that Japanese companies make long-lasting products. This is true – and Citizen is no exception to the rule.
A typical quartz watch will last 20 – 30 years before the movement starts to deteriorate. The Citizen movements are made in-house and last just as long as other Japanese and Swiss quartz.
Citizen gets an edge over its competitors with its Eco-Drive watches. These are the best sellers and the poster-boys of the Citizen brand. Eco-Drive watches will generally last around 10-15 years before the capacitor needs replacing. This doesn’t mean that the watch is broken. It simply means its power reserve will need replacing, similar to a normal watch battery. After this simple procedure, you should get another 10-15 years out of your watch.
Despite saying “only take to a Citizen repair center”. There are specialist watch repair shops that can easily turn around a Citizen in under 15 minutes if they have the correct capacitor in stock. This may void your warranty, but if it’s 10 years after you’ve purchased your watch, there is no harm in going down this route.
Check The Price Of Citizen Chronographs On Amazon
Citizen Watches Are Good Quality
Citizen is not a luxury watch brand, but you will never feel ripped off for the money you spend. Of course, due to its mass appeal, Citizen will never produce a solid gold watch with a very expensive movement. Instead, most of the watches are stainless steel with their in-house eco-drive caliber movements.
There are various models available for different price ranges. At the low end, you will have a standard plain Citizen quartz watch for under $100. At the higher end, you will generally spend just under $2000 for Titanium models with more features than you will ever need. These models typically have a chronograph, analog + digital displays along with perpetual calenders or other complications.
More recently Citizen are following in the footsteps of Seiko and venturing into higher priced watches. They are not a proven player in this price range, but if their track record is anything to go by, you will not be disappointed. Almost all Citizen watches are made in Japan. Various components may be bought in from other countries, but they are almost always assembled in their homeland.
The Accuracy & Reliability Of Citizen
Reliability
In terms of a reliable non-mechanical watch. It is tough to beat a Citizen. The Eco-Drive in particular is very accurate and is accurate to around 20 seconds per year. This means in a worst-case scenario your watch will be 1 minute late/fast after 3 years!
In addition to this, you can walk around and never really worry about your watch losing charge. Due to the eco-drive technology, unless you live in a cave, charging the watch will never be an issue.
Lastly, a lot of Citizen watches can take an absolute beating. Whether this be swimming, running, or diving in the ocean. These Japanese watches are truly built to last.
Accuracy
Perhaps not as marketed as much as it should be. Citizen makes some of the most accurate watches in the world. Their A-T models synchronize with atomic clocks and are accurate to a single second every 100000 years. So there is no need to worry about having the correct time. Based on your location, your watch will sync to the Colorado clock in the Americas, or Berlin if you’re in Europe. If this wasn’t impressive enough, they accomplished this feat by 1993.
As far as Citizen’s other watches go, they are no slouches either. Whilst you will never compete with atomic time, their mechanical movements are also very solid. They almost always use their own in-house Miyota movements. Miyota is certainly not the best mechanical movement in the world but is very solid and reliable.
Does Citizen Make Digital Watches?
Some of Citizen’s best-selling products are digital watches. In the modern-day you will not find a “pure” digital watch made by Citizen since Casio has almost completely taken over this market with the G-shock and other budget models. In the 1990s, Citizen was producing similar watches but has lost this share of the market to its Japanese rival.
However, many of Citizen’s newer models are some of the best digital watches with analog features money can buy. The Skyhawk and Navihawk are not as difficult to use as they look. Once set up, you will be glad that the two models run digitally since this requires a lot less upkeep than running a mechanical watch.
In fact, due to the individual movement of many eco-drive watches. Citizen largely differentiates itself from its competitors. Eco-Drive hands are moved by a kind of “power-steering” for watches. If you’ve never worn an eco-drive before it is quite difficult to explain. However, you only need to turn the hands a small amount for the watch to change time. The hands will move by themselves after a large turn of the crown.
Does Citizen Make Automatic Watches?
Yes, Citizen is well known for being a brand which produces automatic watches and owns 100% of the production. Citizen are not a brand which imports movements from other countries and puts them in to watch cases. All of the Citizen production for automatic movements is done in house.
Other companies purchase automatic movements from Citizen and use them in their own watches. Any watch you see which has a Miyota movement bought this mechanism from Citizen.
Is Citizen A Cheap Brand?
Citizen is not a cheap fashion watch brand. You may be able to find a bargain on the internet once in a while, but they are a respected watch manufacturer. Whilst they are not the most expensive watchmaker in the world, and certainly not a luxury brand, neither are they cheap.
The good thing about Citizen watches is that there should always be something within your price range. Their watches vary from basic quartz to high-end movements and complications.
Citizen watches are almost always made from either stainless steel or titanium. These are not particularly expensive watchmaking materials, but neither are they cheap plated metals that fashion watch brands use.
Where Do Citizen Watches Rank?
Citizen can mostly be ranked next to its Japanese counterpart Seiko. These two brands are the powerhouses of Japanese watchmaking and will continue to belong after we’re all gone.
Overall, I would give the edge to the Citizen Eco-Drive range over the Seiko Solar models. Although with that aforementioned, in the past 5-10 years Seiko has really caught up, so perhaps this comparison is unfair.
In addition to this, Seiko probably has slightly better quality control and also sells higher-end watches such as the Grand Seiko. With that being said, Seiko is generally slightly more expensive than Citizen anyway so you will pay more for this slight difference in quality.
Other than this, there are not too many European Or American brands to which Citizen can be compared to. Outside of Asia, most quartz watches are almost purely for fashion at this price point. Hugo Boss does make some nice-looking chronographs, as do Movado. Although if we are to compare the movement or finish to a Citizen, the Japanese come out ahead once again.
Are Citizen Watches Affordable?
Of course, this question is always going to depend on your personal budget. However, in the western world Citizen would not be described as an expensive brand. Perhaps the top end of their range would not be described as “affordable”, but most of their watches certainly are. The company sells watches in India, which is not the poorest country in the world, but is still some way behind the wealth of western nations. This should give a good indication that the brand is certainly affordable.
Where Are Citizen Watches Made?
This really depends on the model. The higher end Citizen watch models are made in Japan. Cheaper Citizen watches are generally made in either Thailand or Malaysia. Note that these watches will still have Japanese Citizen movements, but are assembled in foreign countries.
Citizen Eco-Drive Watches
Can A Citizen Eco-Drive Be Fixed?
Yes, if your Citizen eco-drive watch is broken, you can send it to an official Citizen repair center. If the watch is out of warranty, there should be a local watch repair guy who can fix it for you. In general, Eco-drive watches are not difficult to fix and mostly just require a new capacitor if not functioning properly.
If you’re unsure whether your watch works properly or not. It is a good idea to test it by pulling the crown out (as to not waste any solar energy) and leaving the watch in a well lit position next to a window for a couple of days. Then you will be able to test whether your watch needs attention or not.
Does Citizen Eco-Drive Need A Battery?
No. Citizen Eco-drive watches run from solar energy and store this inside a capacitor. In general, the capacitor will need replacing ever 10-15 years. A typical quartz watch with a battery needs replacing every 2-3 years.
How Long Do Citizen Eco-Drive Watches Last?
On average a Citizen Eco-Drive will last for well over 10 years. At this point, you may need to get a new capacitor installed. This is not expensive, but will cost more than a standard battery replacement.
Is Citizen Owned By Seiko?
No. Citizen and Seiko are rival companies. They both make solar powered watches, mechanical watches and entry level quartz watches, they are competitors in almost all markets.
Seiko own the brands Lorus, Pulsar & Orient.
Citizen own the brands Bulova & Frederique Constant.
The Most Iconic Citizen Watches
Citizen Bullhead 8110 (The Brad Pitt)
Although Citizen rarely makes mechanical chronographs in recent years, the 8110 bullhead is a classic. The watch was most famously featured in the movie “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood” and is often referred to as the Brad Pitt.
The chronograph watch features an unusual day/date combination at the 6 o’clock position of the watch and also its very obvious and unusual bullhead design. The movement for the watch was developed in 1972 and is still very solid even by today’s standards. If it weren’t for the emergence of the Valjoux 7750 a few years later, it’s possible that the Citizen 8110 would still be a popular movement today.
Citizen Aqualand Promaster
The Aqualand is the most iconic design of the entire Promaster divers series. The oversize watch juts out even further than its rival the Casio Frogman. The model was first released in the 1980s and was quite revolutionary for the time, including a working depth gauge.
Since its release, the Promaster has become a stable product line for Citizen. These days you’re more likely to see a more modern finish with a Pepsi bezel, but nevertheless, these watches originally came from the original Promaster.
Check The Price Of Modern Citizen Aqualands On Amazon
Citizen Promaster Ecozilla
The Ecozilla very aptly named. This watch is iconic due to its sheer size. The case of the watch is 48mm wide and almost 19mm tall. Modern watches have become larger and larger, but the Ecozilla still looks big today. In addition to this, the model was released in 2004 so was way bigger than its competition at the time.
This is genuinely a watch you would never worry about dropping. Perhaps the floor would have more concern if this slipped of your wrist.
Where To Buy A Citizen Watch
Like almost all modern-day products, Citizen watches are generally cheaper to buy online. Trusted websites such as Amazon almost always have a large stocklist and a variety of brand new Citizen watches.
If you’re going to go down the pre-owned route, eBay can always be a good avenue to find a bargain. If you are willing to spend your time studying photos very carefully, sometimes you can get over 50% off retail for something that is almost new.
Lastly, of course, you can always go to an authorized dealer in-person. However, be aware that you will almost always pay significantly more when buying face to face. This is not because the dealer is trying to rip you off, in fact, it’s likely they make far less money than online watch sellers in modern-day. The reason for the added expense is due to retail rents and other costs associated with a brick-and-mortar store.
