Sourcing comparison · Clocks & Watches
Tariff & fee savings only, assuming equal product cost — your actual landed cost also depends on price and freight, which vary by supplier.
| Annual import value | Estimated duty & fee savings / year |
|---|---|
| $50,000 | $1,319 |
| $250,000 | $6,594 |
| $1,000,000 | $26,375 |
Savings scale linearly with volume. Enter your exact figure to model it precisely.
Calculate your exact volume →Sourcing clocks & watches is now a tariff decision as much as a supplier decision. Switch the origin from Switzerland (12.5%) to France (10%) and an importer reclaims about $2,638 for every $100,000 purchased. The duty line moves with paperwork, not production cost, which is why it rewards attention. The breakdown below itemises both duty stacks so the figure is auditable, not asserted.
Consider what each country's goods actually face at the border. Shipped out of Switzerland, the product is hit with a 5% Most-Favoured-Nation base duty and a 7.5% forced-labor Section 301 duty on its clocks & watches, an effective 12.5% once the $49.74 in processing fees are added. France-made goods carry a 5% Most-Favoured-Nation base duty and a 5% forced-labor Section 301 duty on its clocks & watches, an effective 10% once the $49.74 in processing fees are added. Because the MPF and HMF ($49.74 combined) track customs value rather than origin, they wash out of the comparison entirely. Subtract one stack from the other and $263.75 per $10,000 shipment separates the two origins. A $25,000 order therefore differs by about $659, and a $100,000 year by roughly $2,638. Per $25,000 order, $659 separates the two origins — small per shipment, compounding fast across a program.
clocks & watches — Wristwatches, Wall clocks, Alarm clocks, Watch movements, Clock components, Smartwatches (non-Chinese), and Luxury watches and similar goods — falls under HTS 91. Demand for clocks & watches is broad and price-sensitive, which is exactly why a duty wedge of this size reshapes who can supply the US market competitively. For budgeting purposes: watch tariffs affect both luxury Swiss watches (forced-labor Section 301 only, since Section 122 lapsed to 0% on July 24, 2026) and mass-market Chinese timepieces (Section 301 + forced-labor Section 301 + MFN), raising costs across all price segments. Switzerland, in Europe, ships the US mainly pharmaceuticals, industrial machinery, and chemicals industrial compounds. Switzerland has no agreement to soften the stack, so its clocks & watches carries the full column-1 plus surcharge load. France (Europe) sends the United States largely aircraft parts, wine spirits, and pharmaceuticals. France trades under the EU bilateral framework, which shapes the duties on its clocks & watches. With both origins in Europe, freight lanes and transit times are broadly similar, so duty is the cleanest variable to compare. France clears this category at a structurally lower rate than Switzerland, an edge that persists across order cycles rather than a spot-price blip. The figures here reflect the rules in force today; in a year of frequent revisions, the value is in re-running them as policy moves, which this site is built to do.
Anchor your own volume to these tiers: $1,319 at $50,000, $6,594 at $250,000, $26,375 at $1,000,000, and about $2,638 at $100,000. Every figure is produced by the same tariff engine behind the site's calculators, holding FOB value, freight and insurance constant so only the duty effect of origin shows through. These figures reflect tariff and fee savings only, assuming equal product cost — your actual landed cost also depends on price and freight, which vary by supplier. Read the $2,638 as a transition budget — if re-sourcing to France costs less than the annual saving, it pays back inside a year. Diligence on France is commercial, not regulatory: supplier capacity, MOQ, tooling and re-qualification cost — the duty advantage itself is already settled above. Time the switch with the policy calendar in mind — the post-Section-122 picture can favour a different origin entirely. Use the Tariff Savings Finder to test your real numbers and see alternatives beyond France.
At $100,000 of annual import value, switching from Switzerland to France saves an estimated $2,638 in duties and fees, because the effective tariff rate falls from 12.5% to 10%. The saving scales linearly with volume. These figures reflect tariff and fee savings only, assuming equal product cost — your actual landed cost also depends on price and freight, which vary by supplier.
France-origin clocks & watches is assessed a 5% Most-Favoured-Nation base duty and a 5% forced-labor Section 301 duty, for an effective 10% duty rate before the Merchandise Processing Fee ($36.55) and Harbor Maintenance Fee ($13.19).
Switzerland carries an effective 12.5% rate versus 10% for France. The gap comes from differences in the base, Section 232 and bilateral rates that apply to each origin.
Tariff rates from Tax Foundation, USITC, and Penn Wharton Budget Model; retaliatory and industry data from the ITA Foreign Retaliations Database and U.S. Census Bureau (NAICS). Last verified .
