The adult watch market is jam packed, with watch companies constantly battling it out amongst themselves for the biggest market share and most popular product ranges. The children’s watch market is much the same, only rather than precision mechanisms and space age materials luring in the crowds, designers of children’s watches use bold colours, special features and brands to attract their target audience.
The past few years has seen a step away from traditional children’s watches like Timex’s ‘Time Teacher’ and a shift towards more novelty and bold designs from manufacturers associated with children’s brands such as Ben 10, or from more niche manufacturers like Cupcakes and Cartwheels.
As an example let’s take a look at the Ben 10 Omnitrix Fliptop Watch. The face of this watch is enclosed and it’s not until you press a specific button that the themed outer flips open to reveal the time. This watch is perfectly customisable too, featuring 10 interchangeable glow in the dark disks which can be used to instantly change the look of the watch.
It seems that customisable features are one way that manufacturers are making their products more appealing to kids. The Ribbon Watch from Cupcakes and Cartwheels is another example of this. In much the same way as the Ben 10 Omnitrix watch, the Ribbon Watch features customisable aspects in its design. The Ribbon Watch can have its straps switched and swapped and comes with 11 different ribbon straps, each decorated and coloured differently, providing a great level of customisation!
It’s unlikely that unless you have children that you will see the latest trends in children’s watch designs. That said you can be sure that the boundaries will constantly be pushed as manufacturers fight it out in an increasingly competitive market place.