John Smith

Review of Independent Jewellers

TLDR; I will continue to bring my jewelry there as...

TLDR; I will continue to bring my jewelry there as they are great with them but no longer bring my watches.

I write this review with reservations - I must first say that Independent Jewellers are great for jewelry. They have done fantastic work with both my own and my wife's jewelry. However, this review is more intended for watches.

As a watch collector, I have various pieces and have gone to IJ a couple times with them. The first time I was off-put was when both the retail ladies AND the watchmaker had never heard of Jaeger-LeCoultre when I brought mine in... that was a HUGE red flag so I took it back without having them work on it (it is 1 of 50,000 produced, so quite rare and didn't want them to service it). Another example was when I brought in my $1500 Longines and the retail lady was handling it (and almost dropped it) like it was a Swatch or Timex... my palms were sweating as I was so worried she was going to drop/scratch it the entire time she had it in her possession. Lastly, I've also asked whether or not they would be able to work on my Nomos and they had absolutely no clue what a Nomos was. (Just as a side note, some of the staff have a superiority-complex and it is quite obvious as soon as you enter the store. It is quite off-putting).

I understand that JLC, Longines & Nomos are not as commonly known as luxury watches but they are just as expensive and complex as say a Rolex (which everybody knows) and as "Alberta's largest jewelry store/repair", I would expect that they know them.