IndieWatches

Hey Indie Hackers!

I've been a watch enthusiast for years, and one thing always frustrated me: indie and micro watch brands get completely buried on platforms like Chrono24 and eBay. The big names dominate, and smaller independent makers doing genuinely interesting work in the $200 to $18K range just get lost.

So I built IndieWatches (indiewatches.store), a marketplace dedicated entirely to indie and micro watch brands.

I used vibe coding on Lovable to get from idea to live product fast. If you haven't tried vibe coding yet, it's a game changer for getting an MVP out the door without months of dev time. The whole experience reinforced something I keep learning: speed to market matters more than perfection.

I launched on Product Hunt and have about 700 signups with 16 listings live. Every transaction goes through a 14-day escrow service with quality verification, which was a deliberate choice. When I talked to both collectors and sellers early on, trust was the #1 barrier on both sides. Solving that unlocked signups faster than anything else.

The classic marketplace cold-start problem is very real. You need sellers to attract buyers and buyers to attract sellers. Right now I'm focused on directory submissions and SEO to build steady traffic while working on getting more sellers to list. It's a grind, but the early signals are encouraging.

If you've built a marketplace product, I'd love to hear how you tackled the cold-start problem. And if you're a watch person or just curious, I'd genuinely appreciate feedback on the site.

Happy to share more about the build process, the vibe coding experience, or the marketplace model if any of that is helpful.