The red and blue. The Pepsi. For seven decades, no combination of colors in watchmaking has stopped a room quite like the GMT-Master's bi-color bezel. From the cockpits of Pan American World Airways in 1955 to the wrists of Hollywood icons, heads of state, and private collectors, the Rolex GMT-Master 'Pepsi' is one of the most universally recognized and coveted watches ever made.

At Glenn Bradford Fine Jewelry, we have been handling, authenticating, and advising clients on the finest vintage GMT-Masters for nearly four decades. Today, with the modern steel Pepsi officially retired from the Rolex catalogue, the vintage market has never been more relevant, and the knowledge required to navigate it has never been more valuable. This is our complete guide.

Origin Story: Born in the Jet Age

The GMT-Master was born from a partnership between Rolex and Pan American World Airways. As commercial transatlantic aviation took hold in the mid-1950s, Pan Am pilots needed a practical instrument to simultaneously track their home time zone and local destination time, a dual-time complication that was then far from standard.

Rolex answered in 1955 with the GMT-Master, Reference 6542, a 38mm Oyster case housing the Caliber 1036 movement, featuring a 24-hour hand and a bi-directional rotating bezel insert calibrated with a 24-hour scale. The red-and-blue coloring, designating daylight hours in red and nighttime hours in blue, was not merely decorative. It was a functional tool. The "Pepsi" nickname, after the soft drink's iconic red-and-blue color scheme, was born among collectors and has stuck ever since.

The Vintage Reference Roadmap

Understanding the GMT-Master lineage is essential for any serious collector. Each reference tells a distinct chapter of the story, and each carries its own rarity profile and value drivers.

The Nicknames Collectors Use, And Why They Matter for Value

The GMT-Master family has generated more collector nicknames than almost any other Rolex model. These aren't casual shorthand, they signal specific configurations that carry distinct value implications at auction and in private sales.

What Today's Discontinuation Means for Collectors

The retirement of the Ref. 126710BLRO on April 13, 2026 is a watershed moment, and not just for sentimental reasons. When Rolex discontinued the steel Pepsi in 2007 with the Ref. 16710, secondary market values climbed steadily throughout the 11-year hiatus, with the 16710 eventually becoming one of the most sought-after GMT references on the pre-owned market. The return of the steel Pepsi in 2018 did nothing to deflate 16710 values, if anything, renewed interest in the colorway elevated all Pepsi references simultaneously.

The 126710BLRO now enters that same trajectory: a closed production run, finite supply, and a global collector base that understands exactly what they missed. Secondary market prices had already been moving decisively in anticipation of this moment, and the official confirmation will accelerate that trend.

Why Vintage Pepsis, Especially the Ref. 1675, Are the Real Story

When the modern Pepsi exits the catalogue, something important happens in the minds of serious collectors: they look backward. The discontinuation of a crown jewel reference focuses the entire watch world's attention on the lineage that created it, and that lineage runs straight through the vintage market, with the Ref. 1675 at its center.

The Ref. 1675 is, in our view, the single most important Pepsi reference ever produced. It ran for over two decades, from 1959 to 1980, and in that span it accumulated more cultural history, more dial variation, more celebrity provenance, and more collector depth than any other GMT reference before or since. This is not a fringe opinion. Among serious GMT collectors globally, the 1675 is the reference. 

At Glenn Bradford Fine Jewelry, the Ref. 1675 is our wheelhouse. We have spent decades buying, selling, and collecting Pepsis, handling examples across the full spectrum of dial generations, bezel conditions, and case configurations that make the 1675 so endlessly compelling. We know which dial variants are undervalued. We know which examples are overgraded in the market. We know the difference between a watch that looks right and a watch that is right. That knowledge has been built through forty years of hands-on experience, not from a catalogue.

Here is what we expect to unfold in the vintage Pepsi secondary market in the wake of today's discontinuation:

The broader principle has proven itself consistently across the Rolex market: when a beloved reference closes, the watches that came before it do not become less relevant. They become more so. A buyer who spent years on a waitlist for a 126710BLRO at retail, and never got one, does not simply walk away from the Pepsi. They recalibrate. And when they recalibrate, they discover the Ref. 1675: a watch with more history, more character, more variation, and, in many configurations, a more compelling long-term value proposition than the modern reference they were chasing.

We have watched this pattern play out across four decades in this business. The discontinuation of a modern Pepsi is not the end of the Pepsi story. It is the beginning of the next chapter, and that chapter is written in vintage steel, with a faded red-and-blue aluminum bezel and a gilt dial that has only grown more beautiful with time.

How Glenn Bradford Evaluates a Vintage Pepsi

After nearly four decades of buying and selling vintage Pepsis, we have developed a clear and consistent hierarchy for evaluating any example that crosses our desk. These are the four things we look at, in order, and why each one matters.

• Originality First The first and most fundamental question we ask about any vintage Pepsi is whether the watch is all original. That means the dial, hands, bezel insert, case, crown, crystal, and movement must all be correct and unmodified for the reference. A single non-original component changes the character of a watch entirely. A replacement dial, a swapped bezel, a non-matching crown, these are not cosmetic issues. They are fundamental authenticity issues. We have seen more Ref. 1675s misrepresented on this point than any other single factor in the market. Originality is non-negotiable.
• Condition and Polish Once we know a watch is original, we look at condition, and the single most important aspect of condition on a vintage Pepsi case is whether it has been polished. An unpolished case retains its original geometry: sharp lug edges, crisp case flanks, fully intact brushed surfaces on the center links, the correct bevels on the case sides. A polished case loses all of that. It rounds. It softens. It loses the honest record of its age. We will take an unpolished case with honest wear and honest scratches over a polished case every time. The watch is supposed to look like it has lived. What it should not look like is a watch that someone tried to make new again. On the bracelet, we apply a slightly different standard: light polishing on the bracelet is acceptable and common, much as a frame on a picture takes more handling than the painting itself. The bracelet is not the watch. But the case is.
• Patina After originality and condition, we look at patina. On a Ref. 1675, original patina is one of the most beautiful things in vintage watchmaking. The gilt dial aging to a warm honey tone. The lume plots developing that particular creamy caramel color that cannot be replicated or manufactured. The bezel insert fading from a vibrant red and blue to softer, ghost-like tones. These are the marks of a watch that has been lived in, worn, and loved, and they add character that a perfect, unaged example simply does not possess. A strong natural patina on a Ref. 1675 is a value driver, not a detraction. Collectors who understand this buy better watches.
• Provenance We look at provenance last, because it is not required. A Ref. 1675 does not need a famous previous owner to be a great watch. What provenance can do, when it is genuine and documented, is add a layer of narrative that elevates an already exceptional example, as the Brando 1675 demonstrated at Christie's Geneva in 2023. But we would rather own a pristine, unpolished, original Ref. 1675 with no known history than a compromised example with a famous name attached to it. The watch comes first. Always.

The Glenn Bradford Difference

The GMT-Master 'Pepsi' has been a cornerstone of our watch inventory and our expertise for nearly four decades. We have handled examples spanning every generation, from Bakelite 6542s to gilt-dial 1675s to the now-retired 126710BLRO, and we have built the relationships and the knowledge to find, authenticate, and value these watches at the highest level.

Whether you are looking to acquire a specific vintage reference, sell or trade a watch from your collection, or simply understand what you own in the context of today's market, we are here to help. We offer private consultations at our Southampton boutique, remote appointments for clients anywhere in the world, and fully insured shipping for buying and selling, so wherever you are, you have access to nearly four decades of expertise.

Today is a significant day in the GMT-Master story. If you have questions about what it means for your collection, we are ready to talk.