In 2014 there were over 18,000 pre-sales on eBay, resulting in over $5.8 million of resell income for over 4000 sellers.
What’s going on here?
One of the most significant criticisms of eBay is the large and growing number of fake sneakers sold through the site. While we take extraordinary measures to eliminate fakes from our data, that doesn’t necessary help a single buyer looking at a single auction, trying to determine the legitimacy of that particular seller and pair.
We have all seen eBay listings like this:
A few key items of note:
- This is a “pre-order”. The eBay listing was active on January 23rd (when this screenshot was taken) and is selling a shoe (Jordan 4 Oreo) which does not release for almost a month (February 21st)
- It will ship within 3 business days of release
- This is a full size run, plus a note which says to contact the seller “if you are unable to buy your size”
- No refunds after order is placed
- Comes with a Nike store receipt and says that all shoes come directly from Nike or an authorized retailer, but also mentions that “all shoes come from a smoke free/pet free environment”
So is this a listing for a real shoe or fake? There are ten different sentences or words in this post which are intended to guarantee authenticity. But isn’t that exactly what someone selling fakes would do?
What about this post:
It’s basically the same post except these ship NOW – a month before release. Here are a few other notable points:
- Ships from China with replacement box, but factory laced
- Multiple sizes available
- “get them now, no camp out” – Maybe we have a trademark claim 🙂
- “no scammers” – Does that apply to you, too?
- “feel free to ask any question” – OK, I have question, exactly what the f*ck is going on here?!?!
Notwithstanding the many interesting (and legal) questions this post raises, we’re going to focus on the other – the pre-order as opposed to true pre-sale. The overwhelming majority of pre-sales are like the former; they ship post-release. And while it’s certainly possible they are fakes, let’s assume for a minute that all pre-sales are, in fact, real. Isn’t there still a huge issue here – namely, how does one seller have guaranteed access to such a large inventory? It’s a question right at the heart of the sneaker community’s most significant problems. The least we can do is take a look at the data behind eBay pre-sales and see what we can learn.
Let’s start with the most prolific eBay pre-sellers:
Key Insights:
- The green bar is number of pre-sales in 2014. A pre-sale is defined as an eBay sale which was listed before the release date, regardless of when the actual sale occurred. The blue line represents the % of that sellers’ business which is comprised of pre-sales. For example, if a seller sold 100 pairs of sneakers in 2014 and 35 were pre-sales, they would be 35% on the blue line
- There are essentially three tiers of pre-sellers: The top 2, the next 2, and everyone else.
- The eBay sellers “sneakertique” and “monsterhighcustoms03” are on another level, selling 680 and 569 pre-sales, respectively. And note that these represent 84% and 92% of their total business – which means these guys are just crushing the pre-sale market. That’s their game and they are winning it.
- The second tier, at 381 and 315 pre-sales, is still significant, but the percentage of their business is only at 55% and 34%, meaning that while they are pre-selling a lot, they are also selling a lot of non pre-sales.
- It should be noted that in an earlier Campless post titled “WTL 11: Resale Update, Fake Sellers Exposed and Advice” we highlighted monsterhighcustoms03 as having pre-sold many What The LeBron 11s, and implied that they were fake. She took offense to this and began a discussion in the comment section of that post. What followed was a very interesting and very spirited debate with monsterhighcustoms03, myself and one other reader. In the end, it became very apparent that she had sold at least one fake pair of sneakers to this particular reader. I offered her many options to clear her name and she quickly went silent. To whatever extent any of her other 568 pre-sales are fakes, we cannot say, but obviously one is enough to raise suspicion.
In total, there were over 4000 eBay sellers who had sold at least one pre-sale in 2014, based on the 1311 sneakers that Campless currently tracks. Here’s a quick list of everyone with at least 20 pre-sales and the percentage of their total sales:
Once we know which sellers are pre-selling, the next question is obviously “how much”? The below chart plots the overall average pricing for each of the 104 eBay sellers listed above. The X-axis, which runs from -15% to +25%, shows the percent deviation from the market average. For example, a seller who is plotted at +10% on the X-axis means that, on average, their prices are 10% higher than average. The Y-axis here simply shows the number of pre-sales. Note, the top four pre-sellers were omitted from this chart for scale issues, as they each had over 300 pre-sales.
Key Insights:
- This is an interesting way to look at the issue because we’re not analyzing the price of pre-sales. Rather, we are analyzing the pricing of each seller, which includes both pre-sales and non pre-sales
- The overwhelming majority of pre-sellers are priced, on average, more expensive than the market. And 46% are prices at least 5% more than market. Compare that to only 7 total pre-sellers (6.7%) are priced at least 5% less than market
- There are only three sellers with 50 or more pre-sales and are also priced less than market
Finally, let’s look at the shoes themselves:
Key Insights:
- We took a sample group of 120 sneakers – every pair that had at least 1000 sales on eBay in 2014 – and calculated the overall average price for those which sold as a pre-sale versus those listed post-release. The comparison was for deadstock, men’s sneakers only
- The result – not surprisingly – was the pre-sales average $32 (12%) more than non pre-sales. This is supported by prior analyses we’ve done on Jordans and the WTL11.
- If you take away the sample group control and run the numbers for all sneakers, the gap grows slightly wider, to $35 or 13% ($303 vs. $268).
As a final step, let’s take it to the individual shoe level. Of the 1311 shoes Campless tracks, only 1241 had at least one sale of one pair of DS men’s shoe in 2014. Of those, only 252 had at least one pre-sale – that is the $303 vs. $268 referenced above. Here are the 12 which have the highest pre-sale price premium:
Key Insights:
- Four of the top 12 were Adidas. This makes sense given that we know Adidas rarely produces true limited-release sneakers. Every now and then a shoe comes along that we think is limited – like the ZX Fluz Multi Prism – but invariably Adidas will restock it countless times in an attempt to maximize retail sales and, in the process, completely destroy the shoe’s resell value
- The two Li-Ning Way of Wade All-Star 2014 shoes are numbers 1 and 5, respectively, on this list. They are not pictured because we do not have access to high quality pictures. Thanks to Packer Shoes for the Crazy 1 pic we borrowed from their website
In sum, the pre-sale game is strong and getting stronger. There are many sellers who make their living there, while others dabble on occasion. Shoes are more expensive in the pre-sale ocean, and the pre-sellers have higher average pricing. And while we may not know whether the shoes being sold are fake or real, one thing is certain: Becoming a pre-seller takes a serious hook-up. Good luck finding one…
…wait, no, what we meant to say is that one thing is certain: Buying pre-sales comes with inherent risk. Be careful.
Have you bought a pre-sale before? What was your experience like?
