This story was originally published on February 13, 2022. But love is patient, love is kind, and love is sometimes reminding someone that they should insure their watch. 

I’m Marc Hajjar, the Director of Hodinkee Insurance. This wasn’t the meet-cute I intended, but I’m here to wax poetically on something that seems to weigh on the hearts of a lot of Hodinkee’s readers: the passion to collect.

I’m a collector like many of you are. While I’m new to the world of watches (I just bought my first Longines Heritage Sector ‘Classic’ for Christmas), I have been collecting other objects – mostly art and art-related books – for some time now. It was a hobby that was born out of my studies and morphed into a career and then a passion.

What I’ve always found interesting is the impetus behind collecting. Over the years, I’ve spoken to many people who collect all types of objects, from fine art and watches, to more obscure things like vintage fountain pens and dolls. Oftentimes, they shy away from the label of being a “collector” as it can come with several negative connotations. Many just say, “I collect.” The latter is sometimes stated like an admission of an affliction, akin to having a sickness or by being love-drunk by whatever objects they’ve been fixated on, as if to give an excuse for their purchasing habits.

At its core, collecting is a form of love. The act of collecting is a material one, but it is not rooted in materialism. In fact, quite the opposite. A true materialist places the object over any other higher ideal. A collector, on the other hand, sees the object as part of a larger organization or as a representation of something else: like craftsmanship, quality, rarity, or history. For a collector, owning that object is to participate in that higher ideal.

A passionate collector also knows that things can quickly get disorganized. I learned this the hard way. A few years ago, I embarked on a project to catalog everything I owned. I took high quality images of every piece, located copies of receipts, and assigned inventory numbers (I know, it got a little out of hand but I do work in insurance, after all). The culmination of this effort was a secure database, protected by a password that only I knew. Soon after uploading everything to the database, I misplaced the password and had no option but to reset it. That feeling was devastating. How could I have been so irresponsible? I’ve since been searching for an intuitive and transportable tool to keep what I love organized.

For watch lovers, Hodinkee Insurance is first a great insurance product and second, it helps keep your collection digitally organized. In just a few easy steps, you can upload an image, description, and approximate value. Plus, you can add or remove watches from your schedule if your collection changes shape over time. Having everything in one place that is accessible from anywhere is something every collector can appreciate. After all, if we’re going to invest our time and resources into collecting, we might as well protect what we love.

So check out Hodinkee Insurance. I’m sure you’ll fall in love with it too.