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Rolex Banners in Tiananmen Square


freddy333

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Do any of you old-timers recall seeing the photos of Tiananmen Square with Rolex banners plastered all around it?

 

This is going back some 25-30 years, before the Chinese government permitted its citizens to own luxury goods (like Rolex). This was big news at the time because everyone thought Rolex, generally known for having brilliant marketing people, had lost its mind spending large amounts of money advertising to a population that was specifically prohibited from owning their goods. Of course, a couple of years later, when the government changed its mind & began permitting luxury companies to sell in China, everyone declared Rolex's marketing strategy to be a brilliant coup.

 

Anyway, google used to be full of photos of the Rolex banners in Tiananmen Square, but now, after searching through google, yahoo & youtube, I am coming up empty. Not a single pic or reference.

 

Anyone know of an existing photo online?

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Update - I did find a reference to this in Rolex in China - 'Rolex is one of the watch brands who firstly enter Chinese market in early liberation days of China. For quite a long period of time, Rolex is the only brand of watch that Chinese people can think of when they wanted to buy luxury watches. Nowadays, Rolex still enjoy the high reputation it gained in those days.'

 

This quote clearly references Rolex's late 20th Century Asian marketing strategy to plant the Rolex name in the minds of the Chinese people, so that once they were free to make money & had disposable income, they would equate wealth with the Rolex brand & purchase Rolex watches. But I am still searching for some of those pics of Tienanmen Square with Rolex advertising banners.

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  • 4 years later...

Could it have been the other "R" look alike?  'Roamer' was advertised heavily in Asian markets during that time period.  They even used a green backdrop back then IIRC.

 

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-UCDzNydz3IA/UluQNXTO0sI/AAAAAAAAULY/NV4bZcHC4F0/w1200-h630-p-nu/20131014_092458.jpg

 

That is NOT Rolex, it says Roamer....

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On 1/5/2022 at 3:10 AM, Ronin said:

Could it have been the other "R" look alike?  'Roamer' was advertised heavily in Asian markets during that time period.  They even used a green backdrop back then IIRC.

 

No, it was definitely Rolex and they were loudly criticized at the time.

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