G-SHOCK
G-SHOCK HAS
BECOME SOMETHING
OF A CULTURAL
TOUCHSTONE
FOR SEVERAL
GENERATIONS
AND CONTINUES
TO ATTRACT NEW
CUSTOMERS FROM
VIRTUALLY EVERY
DEMOGRAPHIC.
Testing for electronic shock resistance.
But very seldom do we see a more affordable brand hop on the
board and paddle out to these deep waters. But to Casio’s credit, it
has done something very special with its concepts.
Visit any mono brand boutique, and it is not going to be able to
hold absolutely everything available. That is just a fact of life. Team
Casio, however, has created a very welcoming space with a fairly
comprehensive selection of what is available in boutiques as well as
the Casio store-within-a-store concepts.
But G-Shock has grown and evolved beyond mere watches. It
has grown, in many ways, even beyond a Casio brand into its own
identity. G-Shock has become something of a cultural touchstone for
several generations and continues to attract new customers from
virtually every demographic.
I am a perfect case study of this. I was honestly not prepared
for the visceral onslaught that I felt when wandering through these
G-Shock specialist locations. And it became very clear to me that
G-Shock is not merely a brand, it has become something of a
movement.
THE G-SHOCK MEN
Every movement needs an icon, and G-Shock has a few of
them. G-Shock men, robotic characters both small and large, protect
and promote the spirit of the G-Shock.
It is a bit of a whimsical idea, but I can tell you that on our travels,
these G-Shock men were probably the most photographed items.
Customers also frequently request them for possible purchase. And
in many ways that sums up what (for me at least) is the spirit of
G-Shock: very serious, very durable – and still fun.
You could almost see the G-Shock man staring in his very own
action film. And the spirit of fun is also found in the bright, colorful
range of offerings. (During our visit, more than a few requests were
made to purchase the small G-Shock mascots, but all were politely
46 | AboutTime Magazine
declined.)
TRYING TO BREAK STUFF
The second day of our visit to Casio started out with a bus ride
from our hotel in Shinjuko to the Hamura Research and Development
Center in Hamura-shi, Tokyo.
Now for those unfamiliar, allow me to acquaint you with some
realities about Tokyo. It is really, really big. How big? Really big.
Hearing military jets overhead it suddenly occurred to me that we
must be fairly close to Yokota Air Base which is located in Fusa, and
just around the corner from where I used to live in Hachioji.
But I am not going to waste your time traveling down my personal
memory lane. What I am going to do is share what a lot of ten-year-
old boys (and I suspect girls) enjoy doing - trying to break stuff.
The whole idea of the G-Shock was to make something that
could not be broken (more on that to come). But you can’t just say
something is unbreakable–you also have to prove it. And at this
wonderful center in the Tokyo hinterlands Casio has created a facility
where it can try to imagine and replicate every stress, situation,
random bad thing that could happen to a watch.
The original G-Shock was born of a lot of different things - anger,
loss, frustration, denial, determination, and finally triumph. But this
was a long, slow process.
In one of the historic displays I saw a watch completely covered in
tape, which for me at least is truly symbolic of that painful process.
Kikuo Ibe, the creator of the G-Shock, was wearing a traditional,
normal watch that fell off his wrist and broke.
Out of that loss, and his need to build a better mousetrap, Ibe
worked and worked to develop an unbreakable watch, creating the
first G-Shock thirty-five years ago. And the notion of a ball bubbled to
the surface as the ultimate shock absorber.
But needless to say, Casio did not get to have the baby without