By Thursday evening, the line outside the Times Square Swatch store resembled a small roadside encampment. <\/p>\n
Not an unusual sight for anyone in the resale game, looking to make a hefty profit in the aftermarket off a coveted release.<\/p>\n
Nearly half the block between Seventh and Eighth avenues was scattered with foldable camping chairs resting against police barricades. Trash bags, empty coffee cups and personal belongings littered the sidewalk.<\/p>\n
The line outside the Swatch store in Times Square for the limited edition watch collaboration. Christopher Sadowski for NY Post<\/p>\n
A group of men took shifts holding spots while others hit the Marriott Marquis Hotel\u2019s eighth-floor bathroom to clean up or get a quick nap in their car. One woman inched her chair closer to the store as she screamed, \u201cI\u2019ve been here for five days!\u201d<\/p>\n
A middle-aged woman with strawberry blond hair appeared to have overdosed at around 5:32 p.m. while waiting in line. Slumped over in her foldable chair, an NYPD officer arrived on the scene to revive her with Narcan.<\/p>\n
All of this was for a watch that wouldn\u2019t even go on sale until Saturday.<\/p>\n
The frenzy centered on the latest collaboration between Swatch and Audemars Piguet<\/a> \u2014 a limited-edition, bioceramic pocketwatch that merges Audemars Piguet\u2019s iconic Royal Oak with Swatch\u2019s vibrant POP line from the 1980s.<\/p>\n The vibrant Swatch timepieces won\u2019t be available until Saturday. \u2014 but lines started forming earlier this week Robert Miller for NY Post<\/p>\n The retail price ranges from $400 to $420, depending on the colorway, but the resell margins were promising, with early offers into the thousands.<\/p>\n \u201cYou gotta have a lotta balls to be out here,\u201d Luis M., a watch enthusiast and reseller behind HypedUpNYC<\/a>, told The Post. <\/p>\n A woman in line appeared to have overdosed in line for the Swatch collab. Kyra Breslin\/NY Post<\/p>\n Cops came to the stricken woman\u2019s aid with a dose of Narcan. Kyra Breslin\/NY Post<\/p>\n He and his crew had been camping outside the store since Monday. Although he resells everything, he wants to keep this watch. <\/p>\n Someone had already offered him $3,500 for it, though.<\/p>\n \u201cYou gotta know what you\u2019re doing, to be honest,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Watch enthusiasts and resellers camped out for days, many since Monday. Kyra Breslin\/NY Post<\/p>\n Luis said the group rotates shifts overnight and uses nearby hotels to clean up before returning to the line.<\/p>\n \u201cOnce the store shuts down, we run home, shower, change,\u201d he said. \u201cMy car\u2019s right here \u2014 just making use of what we can do.\u201d<\/p>\n But he and his friends were in good spirits near the front of the line and treated the waiting more like an informal backyard hangout, featuring blunts and Modelo.<\/p>\n Down the line was John McIntosh, aka \u201cthe parking pirate,\u201d as he proudly claimed. He\u2019s a known line-sitter \u2014 basically a sin in camp-out culture<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cI was there every day for the Diddy trial<\/a>, Donald Trump<\/a> \u2026,\u201d the bearded sitter told The Post, laughing.<\/p>\n Some work in shifts, others get paid to sit in line with hopes of reselling the watch for a profit. Christopher Sadowski for NY Post<\/p>\n McIntosh had only been there since the morning, but he was hoping someone would pay him to wait in line for them, so he could put that money towards his own watch, which he could flip. Though his eBay account wasn\u2019t working and he had never heard of online marketplace StockX<\/a>, he hoped that maybe a jeweler or tourist would want the limited-edition timepiece.<\/p>\n According to McIntosh, the NYPD had been surveilling the line over the past few days, ticketing some and threatening to remove chairs.<\/p>\n The concept of line sitting has become a common model<\/a> to ensure access to exclusive product drops, sample sales or high-demand store openings. Professionals charge by the hour and can be found on sites like TaskRabbit<\/a> or a kind of \u201cif you know, you know\u201d thing. <\/p>\n A bystander takes a photo of the Swatch display outside the Times Square store on Wednesday. James Messerschmidt for the NY Post<\/p>\n