During the second edition of MicroPraha in Prague I had the opportunity to meet Yu Ando, founder of AndoAndoAndo.
I already followed him on social networks in relation to his work and because I’m also interested in MODs and I know he makes parts for that.
Honestly the guy is super friendly and very fun. I wanted to know more about him and his brand and I was not disappointed.
I’ll let you read the interview 😉
Could you tell us a bit about you and about your story with watches?
Hello! My name is Yu Ando, the founder/designer of AndoAndoAndo. I’m originally from the least populated prefecture in Japan called Tottori (not to be confused with Totoro). And I design a bit different looking watches!
When the idea to create a new brand came to you? and when do you start working on the creation and on the launch of it?
Before starting AndoAndoAndo, I was working as an online content writer for Japanese web media, such as Kotaku Japan (R.I.P. it closed down in I think 2014, along with all the articles me and my colleagues have written), Gizmodo Japan, Discovery Channel Japan, etc. And I was mostly writing about tech and other weird gadgets, as well as other entertainment articles.
At one point I was asked to write articles on many crowdfunding projects, and some of them were watches. And I noticed that there were so many homage watches trying to crowdfund.
Then I realized the existence of vast numbers of homage watch brands, and somehow some people are trying to make new homage watch brands, which I though was crazy. But then I realized not only microbrand, but major watch brands make the same watches over and over again, with less and less innovative designs.
And most often innovative or fun watches you could find sold, were either vintage, super expensive, or cheaply made and not lasting long.
And that somehow reignited my passion for creating things, and also to utilize my education (Bachelor of Environmental Design… which is something I have difficulty explaining what it is, because I don’t understand what I have studied, but definitely there was a part about designing things, I think!), and here I am!
Could you tell us from where comes the name of your brand?
My family name is Ando. And now my wife’s family name is also Ando. And my son also shares the same family name. And my wife came up with originally “Ando & Ando”, but I think there was already a company (or several companies) with that name, so we made it AndoAndoAndo.
(By the way, there is a famous architect in Japan, Tadao Ando, but I’m not related to that one, it’s not an uncommon family name.)
I am aware some people hate the brand name AndoAndoAndo, the same word repeated three times. But considering the vast number of unpronounceable names on the watch world, I think it’s an ok name. And I don’t like doing exercise, but at least the brand name sounds like I’m walking enough in Spanish.
What’s the most important thing in the process of creating your timepieces?
Take people’s advice into consideration. Because their thought process differs from yours. Some people have absolutely amazing ways to connect ideas on some other ideas which you would have never thought of.
Many people would give you different ideas on how you could make something better, based on their values and standards.
But at the same time, unless you shared the whole process of why you come up with this design, they don’t share the level of understanding of your design. Whatever you do, some people would love your design, but others would hate it.
TLDR: Listen to advice, but don’t change your design because others say so.
What steps do you go through to develop and produce them?
So at first, I make physical sketches on paper. Then I make that in 3D using Fusion 360, with the help of a 3D Connection Space Mouse.
After finishing the design of the watch, the data will be sent to a Chinese manufacturer which I trust. They will make sure that the watch is manufacturable, with the planned water resistance, etc.
Either I try to fund it via taking pre-orders or saving money / taking a loan, to make prototypes, and then mass produce.
From where comes your inspiration concerning the design of your pieces?
A watch’s idea, or a concept dictates and restricts the design. For example, an idea such as “a watch dial should have elements that shows 12 hours, and 60 minutes”; from here the thinking process starts. How visible should those elements be, what elements should stand out than the others, how each hand should cover the dial elements, should the elements be looked at from an angle. And of course, the production budget (a.k.a. how much loan I can take without destroying the family finance), or the estimated retail price could be one of those restrictions.Trying to come up with interesting, innovative ways to put ideas and pieces together within those restrictions is fun. But as for the inspiration, I would say I usually get inspired from the details of everyday life, conversation with people, and from playfulness, also from frustrations and stress. I think ideas are hiding in plain sight, or not even trying to hide, but cool ideas or the seeds of ideas are always universally available for anyone and everyone.
One could just need to connect an idea with another idea. For example, you know what a watch does, the shape of the watch movement, and you see a vinyl record player. Both have a round center with rotating mechanism. Some say that it’s too gimmicky to turn it into a watch; others think that it would be a fun and cool idea.
That’s a kind of exaggerated cheesy example, but I think it’s a good example of connecting ideas, and how something so ordinally could inspire something.
Do you have an anecdote about the design and creation phase of your timepieces?
I think when your brain gets a good flow of blood, but in a relaxed state, you would get good ideas. You can connect dots of knowledges into good ideas.
Often I hear people talk about taking a shower before going to sleep, or taking a walk. But with me, who has an IBS-D, it’s the toilet moments that makes me come up with great ideas. 😉 #IBSawareness
From your perception, what makes your watches so special?
That it came from a twisted mind of myself, with support from many watch lovers! <3
Could you tell us how your collection is composed and what is the price of your watches?
The first A-1 Auto, and the subsequent A-2 Auto, are watches designed with practicality in mind.
The Pendant Clock is something that embraces a portable time-piece that can be worn by people, without restricting the time-piece to be worn on wrist (in a way going back the evolution of a wristwatch from a pocket watch).
Ignoring some super cool collaboration watches, the others I designed (the UFO Watches, and the Vinyl Record Automatic) are considered as a kind of blowback from the A-1 and A-2’s practicality. So the UFO and the Vinyl Record Automatic are more fun, not necessarily telling the time easily, but fun and different from the norm of watches.
I try my best to keep the prices low. Because I’m not making watches in order to be rich, but to enjoy the process of creation (while hoping to contribute my family’s finance), and provide people with interesting, and different watches to have fun with. And considering that my customers are very international, and also as individual customer’s financial situations being vastly different from one another, it’s hard to objectively mention the price of my watches, without getting into the price of each component. So let me stop writing about it here 😀
Do you have an idea of how many watches do you already have delivered?
I think it is a bit less than 500 watches at least. I made 400 pcs of the A-1 Auto, and these are almost sold out, and the other watches are selling but not yet close to being sold out.
Do you have an idea of what is your flagship collection?
I have no idea! 😀 Each model is special to me, and I guess which one carries AndoAndoAndo’s flag, is maybe something my customer could each find out!
Do you have a favorite piece in your collection?
At this moment, I like the UFO Watch Prototype the best. Because I can fiddle with the uni-directional bezel when I get bored (and it feels good)!
Social networks are really important for microbrands like AndoAndoAndo. Could you let us know how and why do you use them? and what’s your strategy to stand out from other brands in your price range?
I am not good at taking good photos of my products. So, I use social media mainly to communicate with people. And I think communication is very important whatever you do. I used to fear social media, because I thought the internet was full of mean people. But I realized that if I reply to them in a kind and polite manner, most of them realize that on the other side of their screens, there is another human being. And this, making people realize that it’s another human they are communicating with, instead of a dehumanized anonymous individual, is a key to make the microbrand community, the watch enthusiast community, the world, a better and nicer place for everyone.
As for the price range, I don’t think I can stand out much. My aim is not “to become rich”, that is for sure, but at the same time I have to earn money to pay my rent, and I also have retailers and distributors. So while my watches would not have a high price tag in order for me to be rich, I don’t think I can really compete with other brands that only do B2C sales.
Let’s talk about distribution. Obviously, you use the direct sales strategy which is better for a young brand like yours. Could you explain us your distribution strategy?
The strategy is that, I have no strategy! 😀 So if there are any distributors or retailers outside of Asia interested in my brand, please contact me 😉
What is your first market? Will you try to develop other markets in the future?
Hmm my first market… It might be people who have rather small wrists. There will be one not so small watch on the pipeline, but other than that, I have only been designing small sized watches. This is because I feel that there are enough numbers and variations of bigger sized watches, and so people with big wrists have a wide variety of watches to choose from. While the selections of smaller watches (at least at the time I started designing watches) were rather limited, and watch companies often divided the watch sizes by sex; big “men’s” watches, and “women’s” watches which are small and often decorated with crystals.
Knowing that many decades ago the majorities of “men’s” watches were 20-some mm diameter, and also many women complained those “women’s” watches difficult to check time and overly decorative, and me finding the “women’s” 36mm Orient Bambino a perfect watch for my wrist, made me set my goal of designing small watches for everyone.
Do you plan to participate in watchmaking events in the coming months?
I am terribly under-informed about events and happenings, so if you know any watchmaking events happening near Helsinki, or near Finland, please let me know!!
Now and more generally, what are your plans for the future?
Oh I would love to design and produce more interesting watches. Strange watches, weird watches! The only problem I have so far is that I don’t have the money to make all my ideas come into reality. But I hope this situation will change soon!
I would also like to design toys, gadgets, and other things. I just like thinking about shapes and seeing my ideas coming to life. And I like toys, and watches.
What aspects of your brand you think people should know more about?
Not that it’s a big thing, but I’m not sure if people know about this. So I wanted to use this opportunity to tell; That I design the watch (excluding the movement, stem, strap) myself. I do require help from the manufacturer when it comes to the screwed parts, tolerances, water rating etc. But the hands, dial, chapter ring, case, case back, package, are designed by me, and designed usually around the movement at its core.
OK, now something more personal. For you, what’s the most important thing to find in a watch?
I feel, more and more strongly lately, that, a watch is an item that combines a tool and an art.
Unless it’s a high precision automatic, quartz, or a digital watch, or a smartwatch that syncs to your mobile phone, this tool can only tell you an approximation of the objective time. Not that extreme accuracy means anything to most of us humans, people, system, transportation, etc, anything has a possibility of delaying. And if the delay is not within your control, having the objective time accuracy on your wrist really doesn’t mean anything. However, I believe telling a general time is important in order to live in a society where you have to plan and coordinate things with other people and systems in the society.
At the same time, I think some people feel that having a watch, this tiny machine humanity has spent generations to create, with even smaller parts combined together, on your wrist gives some kind of sense of having a great tool with you. As maybe an extension of your body, your consciousness. And I see this aspect of watch-wearing an emotional element, which is not directly connected to the practicality of the tool and time-accuracy. On top of that, this tool has a shape. It is also something that functions to express yourself, your aesthetics, personality, style. Even those who wear seemingly boring looking smartwatches, many of them seem to choose their own strap colors, materials, extra casing etc, and I think this shows that they are using this wrist-worn device as a tool to express themselves as well as its intended purpose.
So you have this tool that tells you a more-or-less accurate time, has an emotional aspect, and also can express yourself. If this is not a piece of art, what would it be?
To conclude, I guess for me it’s important for a watch to have all these elements in it for the wearer.
To finish, are you also a watch collector? If yes, what kind of watches do you collect?
Yes I LOVE WATCHES! I think I have more than 50 watches at home. But most often my earnings go into prototyping of my next projects, so not so often I get to buy watches I like from other companies. And I also make watches I want to have, so I think I would buy less and less watches in the future, unless some company makes really attractive super crazy watch I can’t resist buying. 😊
Hope you guys have enjoyed this interview. You can follow AndoAndoAndo on the social networks :
If you’re interested to buy one of them, or if you want to know more about the brand, just click HERE.
Jonathan Kopp
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