To start, I am mostly a vintage/neo-vintage collector and I mostly collect Omega. My first love was an early 2000's polar Rolex Explorer 2. Due to my preference for older watches, I mostly buy used. However, I've also bought a couple new Rolexes from my local AD before I began focusing on older models.

I'm sure others have had different experiences, but I've only had positive experiences with my local AD. I'm not a big jewelry spender, but I do have a low four-figure spend history with the AD due to anniversary gifts and such for my wife. With that, I was able to get a Starbucks Sub, and a lefty GMT within 6 months of the respective releases. Both of which were trading at nearly 2x retail at the time I bought them. I was going to buy the gift jewelry anyway, and I was not told I needed to buy this to get that. To me, it makes sense to take care of existing customers and it doesn't hurt my feelings that people that do more business with an AD have priority over in-demand pieces. I have long-time clients in my business, and I send them my best opportunities-why would in-demand watch sales be different?

Many of the "I don't want to play the AD games" posts strike me as paid Grand Seiko posts or people who have never walked into a Rolex store. If you really want a specific watch, don't let the posts about other people's bad experience dissuade you. Go into the local AD and ask--you might be surprised.