Jimmy Tay's boutique Timeless Gallery - in the plush Ion shopping mall - sells luxury hand-crafted watch winders and cases at prices that easily exceed $200,000 - perhaps the only one of its kind in Singapore.

Then again, he's not targeting the average watch lover on the street. Rather, his customers are more likely to be developers of high-class condominiums and interior designers.

No wonder then, that Mr Tay - who started Timeless Gallery with three low-profile partners - keeps a close watch on property prices while courting developers assiduously, whether they are watch connoisseurs or those with marginal interest.

This despite his constant refrain about educating true watch collectors of the importance of keeping their pricey purchases wound, when not wearing them.

But business is business and it makes sense for Mr Tay to focus his marketing strategy more on developers than on watch buyers and sellers - he can sell more to a developer than to a watch aficionado or retailer.

The 50-year-old, a nephew of publicly listed The Hour Glass watch retail chain's chairman, Henry Tay, recently persuaded CityVista Residences to fit the developer's upscale apartments with his watch winders.

He says developers, already dangling free refrigerators, TVs, washing machines and ovens to sell their flats, are always looking out for more add-ons to make their sale more attractive. Why not watch winders and cases?

Mr Tay can pull off the deal with CityVista not just because the products he sells are ultra expensive and custom-made by the finest makers in Germany and Austria; they are also versatile works of art for decoration and safe storage of timepieces, jewellery and shoe collections.

Timeless Gallery sells watch winders and cases crafted by BUBEN&ZORWEG and Dottling. It also sells clocks made by famous German clock maker Erwin Sattler.

Mr Tay, who sees the pick-up in property prices pointing to a resurgence in the construction of condominiums, is knocking on more doors of developers. But while he envisages developers and interior designers to account for a bigger chunk of his business, Mr Tay is not ignoring watch collectors. After all, they led him to quit The Hour Glass to raise about $3 million to start Timeless Gallery.

'There are too many watch collectors in Singapore, I thought,' he recalls. 'So what's next?, I asked myself. And the answer is watch winders.' Not just any watch winders, but the 'creme de la creme'.

Mr Tay says not many people, including serious watch collectors, realise that watch winders help to keep their timepieces - especially the complicated ones - in good working condition. This reduces the need for frequent visits to the watch repairer that could cost a bomb.

'It's one of the most challenging parts of the business - to convince watch owners they need a watch winder,' he says.

Timeless Gallery's watch winders are sophisticated creations which can be programmed for timepieces of different brands and makes. Mr Tay knows what he is into in his venture - and it is not only his decade-long stint at The Hour Glass that he has to thank for it.

He has honed his marketing skills in several airlines where he had worked 11 years. Yet it is the watch business he probably is most familiar with, because he grew up with it.

Mr Tay has helped out in the family's Lee Chay Watch shop since he was six.

'I went to the shop, which was at Adelphi Hotel, every day after school,' Mr Tay recalls. 'I would play with the Rolexes on display, wind them. I learnt about the retail trade and about customers' needs and requirements by hanging around them.'

His most memorable experience of that period, though, was a visit to the Istana in Johor at the invitation of the royal family - Lee Chay's regular customers. 'I remember I was fascinated by the fleet of expensive cars,' he says.

Mr Tay's father, now in his 60s, still runs Lee Chay Watch in Peninsula Plaza on North Bridge Road.

Mr Tay did return to the family business for a while, when his mother was sick. But the man has bigger ambitions. Even when he went to work for his uncle at The Hour Glass, it was to learn the ropes of growing a business into a global brand.

So Timeless Gallery will not be confined to Singapore. In fact, he opened the first boutique in Kuala Lumpur. The ION outlet is his second.

'In four to five years, we want to have a presence in the rest of South-east Asia and North Asia,' Mr Tay says. The ION boutique, opened barely four months ago, has performed better than expected, according to him.

Mr Tay's public relations handler says he has sold four pieces of one of the watch winders, each costing over $200,000.

'The business has an upside growth potential because it has a zero base,' Mr Tay says. 'The realisation of the potential depends on how much effort we put into educating the designers and developers whom we can sell in bulk - and the larger market.'

And the man, who is proud of the fact that he was raised in a tough environment, in a kampung in Potong Pasir, is prepared to slog to put a watch winder in every posh pad - and in the home of every watch collector.

This article was first published in The Business Times.