Introduction: Sneaker Resellers are a Fact of Sneaker Life
Sneaker resellers are a secretive species. They take comfort in the anonymity of their Twitter handles. They stand behind PayPal accounts, not checkout counters. They guard their trade secrets like the Coke formula, and protect their connects more tightly than a coke dealer. And for good reason.
The feelings people have for sneaker resellers are more difficult to understand than the lyrics to “Informer” by the rap genius, Snow. Here’s proof. What’s the first thing that pops into your head when you see this picture? Case closed. Actually, maybe it’s case opened. Either way, scenes like that are everywhere, but it doesn’t necessarily change the game.
There isn’t a sneakerhead among us who hasn’t purchased at least a couple pairs on the secondary market. We’ll be the first to admit that we frequent eBay . . . and browse Facebook sneaker groups . . . and have a rotation of resellers in our DMs. Shit man, only Tinker himself can cop at retail these days – and that’s only because he knows the guy running the raffle. Resellers are a necessary evil – or maybe just necessary, depending on who you ask.
But they’re still secretive. And wouldn’t it be neat, we thought, if we could shine some light into the dark corners of the reseller world? What insights would scurry away and which would stand there for the world to see? And so we did.
PART ONE: THE PERSON
Back in July we convinced a reseller friend to spill his guts – and stood by with a tape recorder. Seriously, we were like a real investigatory journalist; we put the tape recorder on the table and let the dude just talk while we sat there nodding “uh huh, uh huh”. Of course, even the crappiest journalist would’ve had this story published sooner, but we were a tad distracted giving away SEVENTY-THREE PAIRS OF SNEAKERS to celebrate the launch of Collections. Yep, we did that. You can read about it here.
But that’s over, and we’re back to sneakerheaddata . . .
Anatomy of a Sneaker Reseller
Today we introduce the world to Kyle Korver.
Kyle Korver isn’t his real name, of course. We’re going to refer to our reseller friend as Korver for three reasons: 1) to protect his identity; 2) because he kinda looks like KK; and 3) now we have an excuse to include this amazing video compilation of all 221 three-pointers that Korver hit during the 2014-2015 season. If you have nine minutes and sixteen seconds that aren’t being spent having sex with Angelina Jolie dressed as Acid Burn from Hackers, this is the next best thing you can do with your time. (This is true whether you are male, female, straight, gay or other).
Kyle the reseller lives in New York City. We first met Kyle when we asked Twitter for some help with a pair of the Adidas ZX Flux Prism during its initial release; and not the second, third, fourth, fifth or sixth restock.* Kyle sold us the shoes for retail plus expenses. Good start right there. We’ve stayed in touch and have become friends.
[*Seriously, when will Adidas learn? Attention Adidas executives: If you can’t figure out how to play the limited-release shoe game by watching Nike, we’ve created a playbook for you. Read this.]
We sat down with Kyle for a few hours. He shared tales of reselling and LOTS of data. He is extremely organized and has kept meticulous records. KK’s wealth of data was the initial impetus to write this piece, but the more we learned, the more we knew this was a story as much about the person, as the data.
Korver is a reseller, for sure, but sneakers don’t pay the bills. In fact, he is not otherwise associated with sneakers at all. He earns his living as an optician (one who makes glasses) and an actor (one who makes believe), and he’s quite talented at both. Kyle made it explicit that no matter what hat he’s wearing – optician, actor or reseller – he’s all about customer service. Put another way – Kyle is a salesman at heart. Put yet another way – dude can sell a ketchup Popsicle to a woman wearing white gloves.
So why sneakers?
Motivation
Kyle’s intro to the sneaker game was an unintended consequence of reading lifestyle sites like HighSnobiety and Hypebeast. He used these sites to keep his finger on the pulse of style while attending school in the early two thousands, and continued to do so after his return to the Big Apple. Not immediately drawn to the Jordan retro game, Kyle was a runner/trainer guy at the time. It should be no surprise then, that Korver can trace his sneaker watershed (sneakershed?) moment back to some early Ronnie Fieg collabs.
After getting shut out trying to cop the Asics GTII Super Red online, Kyle’s next target was the Asics Gel Saga Neptune Blue. When the Neptunes dropped, Double-K completed the online transaction quicker than real life Double-K can get off a three. And the shot looked good (he received an order confirmation) . . . but it took a bad bounce off the rim at the last second (six hours later he received an order cancellation) . . . and Kyle’s smooth e-commerce bucket was actually a brick.
While this sort of thing is the norm today, back then hope was still a strategy. So, in an attempt to plead his case and maybe still cop the Neptunes, Kyle walked down to the offending sneaker shop to have a face-to-face with anyone who would listen. Korver was disappointed to find that the staff in question did not embrace his own passion for customer service. The Neptunes were sold out and he could politely go fuck himself.
From there on out, Kyle made it his mission to cop BIG, with a particular focus on shops that had burned him in the past. Unlike the large majority of resellers today, Kyle did NOT get in the game for the money. In fact, at first, he pretty much resold for cost. Reselling was purely a way help out other heads. For Kyle, it was all about the assist . . . which is somewhat confusing because the real Kyle Korver, as we know, is all about the shot – as evidenced by this amazing video compilation of all 221 three-pointers that Korver made during the 2014-2015 season. Whoa, déjà vu. Glitch in the Matrix?
Of course, KK quickly figured out that reasonable profits could be made flipping kicks . . . but the extra dough in his flow was really just an added bonus for doing good unto his fellow sneakerhead.
Perfecting the Craft
With the decision to embark on the reseller path made, the next challenge was to get good at it.
With a Kobe-like intensity Kyle figured out the most efficient way to buy from every site. He found their backdoors and shortcuts, anything to guarantee that his add-to-carts would come out unscathed. KK discovered every sneaker retailer in the world, including some that aren’t even online. He figured out which sites charge the least for international shipping, and which refund the VAT. He practiced checking out on hundreds of sites, and would stack up on dozens of Nike gift cards with exactly the right amount of money on each. Dude was methodical.
The pinnacle of Kyle Korver’s resell career was during the Nike Twitter RSVP era. By then he had diversified his approach to the game and was flipping anything and everything – not just runners. Between working tirelessly with various programmers to perfect his Twitter RSVP bot and using his acting skills to build close relationships with people at every level of every sneaker shop possible, this was when K-squared made the jump from “a dude” to “a dude who can get shit.”
Here’s just a sample of some shit he done got:
- 15 pairs Jordan 11 Concord Low
- 12 pairs Kobe 9 Elite Multicolor ID
- 10 pairs Lance Mountains Black
- Once he copped a pair of the Supreme Flyknits online while standing in line at Supreme. He tried to share his find with the other people in line, but no one believed him. Ultimately, he pulled a pair on his phone right as the security guard was letting him in
The key to KK’s reselling success is that 99% of his time and effort is spent buying. He doesn’t waste any more time than necessary selling. His focus is on figuring out which shoes to buy (including the best size), where and how to get them. Selling is an afterthought; he sells almost exclusively through Flight Club these days, with an occasional pair here and there sold directly to a friend. 89% of his sales in 2015 were at Flight Club. Gladly paying their commission, Kyle lets FC handle all the low-value-add activities: storing, shipping, returns, collecting money, etc. And because Kyle can float the cash, he can get a premium price. When you’re flipping as many pairs as Kyle is, who wants to go back and forth negotiating via DM? Or trying to sniff out scammers? Or packing boxes? Or emailing tracking numbers? No one, that’s who.
The point is, Kyle has a business model, while most resellers use the classic South Park gnomes’ underwear business plan.
How Good Can You Get?
Kyle’s most impressive resell W was the Jordan 5 Doernbecher release. He was able to secure 15 Twitter RSVPs and successfully purchase all of them on release day. We know what you’re thinking: “How the fuck did Kyle Korver buy 15 DB5s on release day when each RSVP had to be assigned to a unique person and Twitter handle?” Obviously we’re about to tell you how.
Channeling his inner Hannibal Smith (from the A-Team – the show, not the movie), Kyle orchestrated an exquisitely clever plan using Task Rabbit. If you don’t know, Task Rabbit is an on-demand concierge/personal assistant website where you can pay someone to do shit for you – pick up your dry cleaning, mow your lawn, chew your food – whatever you don’t feel like doing yourself. In Kyle’s case, he placed an order for 15 different people to wait in line for him at 21 Mercer and Niketown.
The effectiveness of his Twitter bot aside, the real genius in his plan was how he coordinated the interaction with each line-waiter. Task “Rabbits” charge a pre-determined rate for their task, so having all 15 stand in line all day could have cost a pretty penny. But what Kyle did was wait in line himself and then call each Rabbit to meet him at a specific time, right as he was getting to the front of the line. When one Rabbit would go into the store to get a pair, Kyle would go back to the end of line again. The Rabbit would bring out the DB5 assigned to their name, Kyle would call the next Rabbit to meet him at the front of the line, and so on, and so on. Each Rabbit only spent a total of 5-10 minutes “on the clock”. Fucking brilliant.
The plan was so fucking brilliant, in fact, that he became a Task Rabbit legend. In the planning stage of the DB5 release Kyle called the Task Rabbit support line numerous times to make sure what he was doing was kosher. They not only thought his plan was fair, but worth mentioning at their staff meeting. Other members then started copying his methods.
But back to the Doernbecher 5s…
It was around the moment when Kyle was holding five or six pairs in line that another onlooker offered him $1000 cash on the spot for a pair, which of course he gladly accepted. Others in line starting grumbling under the assumption that Korver was somehow plugged into the store and getting pairs “that fell off the truck” but the reality was much simpler: Kyle beat the system that day.
To quote Kyle, “He who knows, wins.” To quote Hannibal, “I love it when a plan comes together.” And to quote Mike Tyson, “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.”
PART TWO: THE DATA
As mentioned above, Kyle kept meticulous records of his resell business and, under condition of anonymity, agreed to share his ledger. What follows are some of the most interesting highlights from Kyle’s first two-and-a-half years on the NYC reseller circuit:
Total Sales:
Key Insights:
- 2014 was by far Kyle’s most prolific year with 225 total pairs sold, and an average of almost 19 pairs sold per month.
- 2013 was his most profitable year on a per shoe basis, making $146 per pair, compared to $124 in 2014 and only $87 in 2015. This has as much to do with increased competition as anything. As more resellers enter the market, it pushes prices down, all other things being equal.
- The post-TwitterRSVP resell era has been tough, averaging only 5.8 pairs per month. The continual changing of sneaker distribution will always have a huge impact on the success of any reseller.
Most Prolific Shoes Sold:
Key Insights:
- It should be no surprise that Concord 11 Low and Black Infrared were the most prolific shoes sold by Kyle. These are two of the top ten shoes sold in the market, as a whole, according to Campless sales rankings.
- Gotta love the hustle that Kyle was able to sell 12 pairs of the Kobe 9 Multicolor IDs!
- The pair that has a warm place in our heart is the ATC2 French Opens with 9 pairs sold. Good for Kyle, selling them at an average price of $230 during the hype period. Today you can find pairs for almost retail. Turns out not nearly as many people are Agassi fans as they thought when these dropped.
- Note: Only 7 of the 15 Jordan 5 Doernbechers mentioned earlier were sold. Kyle used the other 8 for trades and to hook up friends and connects.
Most Expensive Shoes Sold:
Key Insights:
- No matter how you cut the data, there is some serious heat on this chart. Let it never be said that Kyle couldn’t cop the best. But also note that for six of these ten shoes he was only able to cop one pair.
- Kyle has a good story about the Lebron 10 MVP: He won the Niketown raffle but when he got to the store they had sold it. He spent the next few days working his way up the managerial chain at Niketown before finally finding someone high enough up to not only admit to the mistake, but also find him another pair. That would NEVER happen today. Oh, such innocent times, way back in 2013.
Sales by Channel:
Key Insights:
- Although Kyle was always a heavy Flight Club seller, early in his resell career he dabbled with many other channels, including eBay, social media, sneaker blogs, Craigslist and other consignment shops.
- As he refined his process, Kyle shed most other channels and became a Flight Club soloist, selling 89% of his 2015 shoes through the consignment giant.
Sales Price by Channel:
Key Insights:
- For this analysis we compared each of Kyle’s sales to the Campless market price for each shoe, to determine if he was selling for more or less than market. We then aggregated those values by channel to see where Kyle made the most (or least) money.
- A big reason to use Flight Club is because it makes selling easy – particularly if you live in New York City. But this chart shows that you can also get a premium price there. Kyle earns, on average, $64 more than market on every pair sold at Flight Club (after fees).
- Kyle’s dedication to the assist is clearly supported by the data. He gives up $75 per shoe for each pair he oops a friend. That’s a good friend right there. Let’s be honest – all of us have at least one friend who isn’t worth anywhere near 75 bucks.
What does it all mean?
There is endless debate over resellers, and it’s not likely to end anytime soon. The loudest voices are usually people denigrating them as the scourge of the earth, blaming them for ruining the sneaker game. Well, here’s a guy like Kyle. He’s relatively new to sneakers but he’s as much a resell force as anyone out there. But when you look at how he does what he does, and why, his story has a lot of similarities to Robin Hood, actually.
This begs the question – regardless of cool stories or interesting data – whether reselling is an inherently selfish act, or one based on sharing and mutual benefit? The truth, like anything, is a spectrum, and each reseller falls somewhere along it. Understanding that spectrum is core to forming an honest opinion on the subject – at least that’s our take.
We let Kyle the Reseller see the first draft of this piece (including the Korver analogy) and asked for some final thoughts on the bigger picture. This is what he said:
The majority of my time is spent figuring out what shoe to buy. It’s a multivariate equation that frequently changes by the second, however one of the most important factors is the question of the assist. To oop the friend/connect or not? We all get burned and all do some burning, but it’s the communal buzz that plays the ultimate factor in resell value. So it would be futile to only buy shoes based on my taste and assume those would be winners in the resell market. I don’t know enough about the real Kyle Korver to say that his unbelievable scoring comes from him being an outstanding teammate. But I will say that none of my successes and stories would be possible without developing a game that is inextricably tied to other people and their efforts. And I have and will always share those wins, in my own unique way, of course . . . and not by shoutouts or retweets! That’s why focusing on the assist is so important to me.
So there you have it. Confessions from one New York City sneaker reseller. Love him or hate him, he is as much a part of this community, this culture, this industry as you.
What do you think about Kyle?
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Have a good resell story to share? Email [email protected]
