OK I'm new here, being a keen watch enthusiast since the last 20 years or so, I've just discovered the world of 'decent' replicas... I've always been a steel sports chrono fan and my 'most-wanted' as a twentysomething was predictably a steel Daytona - which I eventually achieved, having gone through a few Omega speedmasters, seamasters, an Explorer II and finally the Daytona (all genuine). Bad luck befell my business last year and I had to sell off the watches, keeping some of the more inexpensive but still interesting pieces like my Sinn 356 II with the copper face.
As things picked back up I thought about buying watches again, but part of the problem behind my profitability interruption was due to closed-shop 'rip the customer' practices... and as my watch knowledge increased, I saw more and more top brands selling very expensive watches with ETA movements in them. The finishing would be of a higher level, but there were very few people outside the haute horlogerie heavens making their own movements in-house (save Rolex, who sell a LOT of watches). This seemed a bit like a rip off to me... so I did some more investigation about replica watches with ETA movements (or, as it turns out, exact copies of ETA movements).
My initial thoughts were that the quality of the replicas must be appalling, because the replica is simply an ETA movement in a stainless steel case and bracelet, just like many of the genuine watches from the mid-high end brands, and there's a 10-fold difference in price.
So, having decided that any money spent on genuines must now be spent on special movements or base movements with special complications, I got a steel Breguet Type XX flyback and 'invested' a couple of hundred quid in a couple of replica Submariners from a dealer recommended on these forums. One bottom-end one ($110, which is about