2 minute read

Sneaker Resale Culture

SELLING US 9 OW CHICA- GO 1 / $2300 OBO (DS). This might just look like a coded message, but, to the trained eye, this is one hell of a deal. In the past few years, Kanye’s YEEZY x Adidas and Virgil Abloh’s OFF-WHITE x Nike footwear collaborations have become household names among teens and young adults. Unique sneaker designs combined with celebrity-endorsed marketing campaigns and ridiculously low stock have made these shoes some of the hottest items in fashion. It’s simple economics. Companies like Nike, Jordan, and Adidas manipulate the market to generate hype for their brand by intentionally limiting available supply. With demand so high and supply so low, these limited sneakers sell blindingly fast at their original retail prices. But, after the retail market has sold out, the resale market opens. Resellers camp out at stores, wait on websites until 3am, and even build specialized computer programs just to secure a coveted pair of sneakers at their retail price upon release. The sneakers are then immediately made available for purchase to people who initially missed the chance to buy them–at a 300% markup. Sneakers originally priced at $250 can balloon to nearly $2000. Crazier still, people will buy them. Resale apps that broker sales between buyers and resellers, like popular application StockX, process thousands of transactions every single day, as do other public platforms, such as Facebook Marketplace, Kijiji, and eBay. The sheer number of marked up, resold sneakers moving through the market speaks to the consumer value of sneaker culture. This is the price for an air of exclusivity. Simply owning a pair of popular sneakers sets you apart in the fashion world by contributing to a covetable sense of personal style, but is this image really worth the excessive markup in price? Ultimately, it depends on the individual. Some people have the disposable income to finance a healthy sneaker habit and are quite happy to pay resale prices, especially if it means avoiding the wait online or the campout in-store. Other people don’t care about the culture at all, and are satisfied with buying shoes that are affordable and more widely available. Most people, myself included, lie somewhere in the middle. The fact of the matter is that resale culture is a product of the footwear’s limited nature, and with companies profiting from the hype generated by the sneakers, there’s no expectation for the trend to disappear anytime soon. So what can you do? If you really want the next hype sneaker, you can always invest the time and buy at original retail sources. If waiting isn’t your game, try finding a friend who works at a shoe store (“the plug”) or, depending on how much you are willing to invest, find the sneakers at a resale price your wallet can handle. If all else fails, just move on–there’s always another pair of hype sneakers dropping next week.

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by Jeremy Marasigan