Authorized dealer selling only to local residents?

[DocOc]

I recently encountered an authorized dealer who’d only sell the hard-to-come-by Rolex sports models to local residents.

Is this permissible? Legally? Or by Rolex?

[imsayingthough]

Yes.

[JayHantz]

It is, and smaller ADs often do this.

[padi56]

Originally Posted by DocOc

I recently encountered an authorized dealer who’d only sell the hard-to-come-by Rolex sports models to local residents.

Is this permissible? Legally? Or by Rolex?

Any retail business can sell or not sell to whoever they want too.

[prnceofpersia23]

Yes. Mine does this.

[Arid]

Yes, very much so.

[franktehtank]

Quit trying to horn in on our small town local AD's. City slickers! lol

[dafuture]

Pretty standard in my experience. They'd rather develop a relationship with locals, plus they're less likely to flip for profit than someone calling on the phone.

[Davidt]

Same here. Mine told me they get countless phone inquiries but prefer to
Sell to people who are reasonably local and call into the store.

[breitlings]

Wouldn't surprise me at all. They used to do this with mid-engined v8 ferraris, don't know if they still do.

[SeaDweller50]

This is extant in the U.K. too as far as I’ve encountered.

[PBJ1925]

Up to the AD as many have said. There are those who will ship, or sell out of local market and those that won't.

[JodyHighroller]

Rolex pushed ADs to cater to locals primarily towards the end of 2019 moving forward. Plenty of posts regarding it if you search. Of course, this is all dependent on the AD enforcing as some are located in tourist destinations. If you have a potential sale of someone in store for something in the window, I highly doubt they won’t sell to you if you’re not local. The idea is to keep those watches in the specific regions where they were sold to help balance out inventory.

I think after you complete a few transactions in person, the AD will be comfortable doing business from afar.

[ArtNouveau]

Originally Posted by JodyHighroller

Rolex pushed ADs to cater to locals primarily towards the end of 2019 moving forward. Plenty of posts regarding it if you search. Of course, this is all dependent on the AD enforcing as some are located in tourist destinations. If you have a potential sale of someone in store for something in the window, I highly doubt they won’t sell to you if you’re not local. The idea is to keep those watches in the specific regions where they were sold to help balance out inventory.

I think after you complete a few transactions in person, the AD will be comfortable doing business from afar.

This. In the good old days I’m sure ADs in tourist areas sold to anyone who walked in. Nowadays they would rather cultivate long term relationships with repeat buyers.
There’s a good chance I will be retiring soon and moving out of state. I suspect as long as my SA is still there, I’ll be able to buy with a phone call.

[Goin2drt]

Originally Posted by DocOc

I recently encountered an authorized dealer who’d only sell the hard-to-come-by Rolex sports models to local residents.

Is this permissible? Legally? Or by Rolex?

Good for them and well played.

[NeedMoreCoffee]

Is it legal for a private business to set their own policies? I would say yes...

And good for them.

[Macnavara]

Originally Posted by poweredbyjae

Up to the AD as many have said. There are those who will ship, or sell out of local market and those that won't.

In the uk Rolex wont allow new watches to be posted....they have to be collected in person.....seems like a different policy in the US.
This rule of having to collect is going to make vat refunds a thing of the past in the uk as it can only be refunded if posted overseas to the purchasers address....forcing you to pay the duty on receipt

[septantrionalis]

This happened to me when I purchased my Explorer. I walked in and put my name on the list. Nine months later, they called me, but they wanted to verify that I lived in the area before they sold the watch to me. Crazy.

[Harry-57]

Originally Posted by DocOc

Is this permissible? Legally? Or by Rolex?

Yes. Yes. Rolex can't dictate who an AD sells watches to and they don't care.

[VintageVagabound]

Originally Posted by Harry-57

Yes. Yes. Rolex can't dictate who an AD sells watches to and they don't care.

Within reason...the AD can limit customers to local or regional but cannot avoid sales based on race, religion, ethnicity, or sexual orientation . The reality is that you can be from Timbuktu and if you offer to buy eight diamond crusted lady datejusts from some random AD, they’ll sell you whatever you want.

[brandrea]

I live at “no fixed address”

[EEpro]

Originally Posted by DocOc

I recently encountered an authorized dealer who’d only sell the hard-to-come-by Rolex sports models to local residents.

Is this permissible? Legally? Or by Rolex?

Yes and I'm the grateful recipient of subs and OP turquoise and Pepsi on account of this.

[Token74]

Originally Posted by EEpro

Yes and I'm the grateful recipient of subs and OP turquoise and Pepsi on account of this.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Harry-57]

Originally Posted by VintageVagabound

Within reason...

Rolex can tell an AD who they can and cannot sell to within reason? They can't and they don't.

Racial, gender and orientation discrimination are unrelated matters and very serious. And it's a big ask to prove conclusively, since a seller can always chose who they do and don't sell to and are not required to say why.

You appear to be conflating two unrelated things. If there is an AD anywhere in the world who is demonstratively exhibiting unambiguous bigoted behaviour they should not, and hopefully will not be an AD for much longer.

[HiBoost]

Just asked my AD about this today and they will not ship anywhere. I guess all those years of listening to remarks about living in a "flyover state" has at least one upside haha.

[1665fan]

Mine says the same thing and has only offered me a white dial exp 2....and I’m local but don’t buy a bunch of worthless jewelry

[pamountainbiker]

My AD also sells to locals only, when I picked up my 126610 in the Fall we were talking about the craziness in the steel sports segment and he mentioned that he gets tons of calls asking about inventory, returns very few, and only returns the ones that he can be reasonably sure are from locals (by area code or by the caller saying where they are from). They also hold the warranty card for about a month. I normally communicate with him either via going into the store, text or e-mail. I never call the store number. As a side note, this makes it very difficult to build relationships with other brands that I have a hard time visiting (posted about this in the Patek Forum) because I'm sure they have some of the same practices. I live in a small market (obviously big enough to have a Rolex jeweler - exactly 1), but not other brands, ironically not even Omega without a drive. We're a third-tier market where generally the most expensive car you see around these parts is a Mercedes AMG or BMW M5, like twice a year. BTW, when I picked up my sub and was on my way out, he called out..."let me know when to get you down for the Daytona." I laughed as I waved walking out the door - I think he was joking...

[Alliy]

Yes.

[214270Explorer]

Mine only sells to locals who are walk-ins.
No phone or email sales.
Being in a very high affluent area /tourist area of the Southwest, this AD has had tons of out-of-state and out-of-COUNTRY people dropping in, attempting to make mass buys.
So you see, they had to implement their policy to make it fair to locals.
Family-run AD, and one of Rolex's U.S. highest-volume sellers.
They sell tons of Rolex to locals who are COO's, other major business people, local athletes and their families, etc. They do a huge volume of sales just on locals alone.
This AD does not fool around with stupid games such as forcing people to buy extra watches or jewelry, or back-dooring to the Gray market.
They are also always on the lookout for the 'drop-in flippers' who may also be locals.
But the wait for the 'popular Gotta Haves' can be years as they admitted to me.
Fortunately those models are of no interest to me.
This AD has sold a 'good number' of Rolex to me over the past 34 years. The owner knows me well, and knows I am no flipper. About three years back I even wore my year 1987 OPD to his shop just to remind him what he sold me as my first Rolex. He enjoyed the talk we had about it and he reminisced about his earlier years as a Rolex AD.

[jb335]

I don't really blame them. Better to build relationships with locals and get repeat customers.

I'm sure they don't only sell to locals, but more likely prioritize them.

If a tourist came in wanting to buy all their Cellini's, I am sure they would take their money. Or smaller ladies DJ.