For his friends who grew up with him in Singapore, Justin Reis has always been the perfect student. Says Matteo Mango who went to high school with him, “He always got the best grades; he was amazing at math; he was always the guy that we knew would succeed. At the same time, he was always humble, soft-spoken and understated. Even at that age, he was the consummate gentleman.” Reis went on to a successful career in finance before he, along with Danny Govberg and Singaporean retailer Tay Liam Wee, founded WatchBox when they identified that the pre-owned or secondary watch market was potentially larger than the primary market. But after a few years finding their feet, it was clear that WatchBox needed some dynamic impulse to truly kick over into high gear. That happened when Reis was appointed the company’s CEO and moved to the company’s headquarters in Philadelphia.
Says Lee Chong Min, one of WatchBox’s board members and early investors, “WatchBox really became successful and accelerated when Justin moved to the U.S. and began working closely with Danny [Govberg]. They are incredibly complementary and, together, they took the visionary stance not simply to be a pre-owned player but to dominate the high-end category and become key tastemakers and communicators.” It was in Philadelphia where Reis demonstrated his capacity to learn, assimilate and innovate with extraordinary speed and efficiency. Soon, WatchBox was not just a key secondary market player, but had a decisive role in championing independent watchmakers like François-Paul Journe, H. Moser & Cie., Greubel Forsey, and more.
In 2021, they unveiled an even more ambitious strategy with the announcement by their parent group of the acquisition of De Bethune. Within a short time, they had demonstrated the power of WatchBox by transforming the brand into one of the hottest properties in the horological stratosphere. Such was the rising collectibility of De Bethune watches that they surged dramatically in price on the secondary market. But even more impressively, Reis and WatchBox demonstrated what no one had thought of — to harness the power of the secondary market to empower the creation of a new mini group.
Sitting down with Reis, the biggest takeaway for
