Pre-owned luxury watch retailer WristCheck in Hong Kong looks to shake up a fast-growing market
- Founded by watch influencer Austen Chu and business partner Sean Wong, WristCheck aims to bring an elevated buying experience to the second-hand market
- Chu, 24, says he poured his own worst experiences of watch buying into building the brand, including being ‘treated like s***’ in watch shops
Once dismissed by the biggest names in watchmaking and left to boutique retailers and private dealers, the pre-owned luxury watch market has exploded in recent years and is now the industry’s fastest-growing category, with sales predicted to reach up to US$32 billion by 2025, according to a June report published by McKinsey and trade publication The Business of Fashion.
Hong Kong, long a global centre of watch retail, has always had a robust market for pre-owned watches, dominated by distinctly unglamorous small watch shops located in Tsim Sha Tsui, Mong Kok and Sham Shui Po serving a local and older clientele rather than collectors.
In recent years, a new breed of pre-owned retailer has staked a claim in the city, opening boutiques in Central and concessions in larger retailers such as Lane Crawford. The likes of WatchBox, Watchfinder and The Vintage Concept are all hoping to tap into the surging interest in pre-owned watches from young, savvy, international collectors.
To that list can be added WristCheck, a start-up established at the beginning of this year which opened its first store in the Landmark Atrium mall in Central in September. The brainchild of watch influencer Austen Chu and his business partner Sean Wong, WristCheck has created an innovative multi-use space that brings the elevated experience of buying new watches to the second-hand market.
Described as a “hang-out” space, the new boutique features a fully stocked bar, an interactive augmented reality video wall and tech-laden display cases, making WristCheck a far cry from the staid, tradition-led boutiques of the big Swiss brands.
