6 ms·

What’s the draw for being so into sneakers? Do you resell them to make money? Wear them? Collect them like stamps?

grenoire 8y ago
Collection value mostly, rarity plus vanity.
kfichter 8y ago
I used to write sneaker bots “professionally” (was pretty much my full-time job) back in college. Did it for a variety of reasons. The money in reselling is decent but you can usually make more by selling the software itself. I collected a few rare pairs and definitely found that fun. Also highly ego driven and there’s an entire “sneaker Twitter” community where people just want to show off. I was mainly into it for the software engineering side of things. You end up having to build really interesting/complex software. My infrastructure was basically half a dozen servers with a coordinator that would scrape websites all day long. Also had to learn how to exploit different features of websites to speed things up. Generally enjoyed it but the community is pretty toxic. Mostly driven by money and ego, no room for collaboration because it’s more profitable to keep things to yourself.
- b_tterc_p 8y ago
  Selling shovels to gold miners basically. Nice. Can you explain how you find people to sell software too and how realistic your value prop is? It doesn’t quite sound logical to me (and maybe it isn’t?). Your software finds margins of x, but surely only so many people can make use of it before it stops working for anyone.
  - moate 8y ago
    I think the bots are being used to buy the sneakers from direct sales channels (Nike, Footlocker, primary market sources) and then you'd flip them on the secondary market. Basically the direct channels will sell the shoes at "reasonable" prices but well below what the secondary market is willing to support so you can walk out the door and immediately sell them for 2X+ what you paid. You see similar things in rare craft beer releases.
  - kfichter 8y ago
    Mmmm you typically limit releases of your software for exactly this reason. Best model so far has been subscription based with a limited number of total subscription. I’ve seen it generate a huge amount of revenue (upwards of 300k annually). It’s in everyone’s best interest to keep the total number of bots in circulation relatively low. Helps that genuinely good software is difficult to write and most people doing that work are young/inexperienced - huge advantage to anyone with a strong softeng background.
- ronyfadel 8y ago
  Hey kfichter, care to share what your stack looked like? Did you use any public libraries (e.g. BeautifulSoup)?
nwhatt 8y ago
Same as collecting anything, stamps, action figures, classic video games. There's some intrinsic value (wearing them on your feet), a story to each item (and possible emotional connection), and then the resale value.
standerman 8y ago
Marketing by Nike. Have you noticed how many pop culture figures wear Nike and Converse (mostly Chuck Taylors) which is owned by Nike? That's no accident.
- mikefivedeuce 8y ago
  I think it's also a demographic trend. Many of the releases are re-issues from a time when we were kids and wanted to wear the Jordans / Pennys / Grandmamas / Ewings we saw on TV but couldn't get our parents to spring for them. Now we're older with disposable income and, although expensive, for the most part they aren't crazy expensive. I mean, a pair of decent dress shoes cost more than my Tinkers... but nobody has ever stopped me on the train to tell me how dope my oxfords are!

Collection value mostly, rarity plus vanity.

I used to write sneaker bots “professionally” (was pretty much my full-time job) back in college. Did it for a variety of reasons. The money in reselling is decent but you can usually make more by selling the software itself. I collected a few rare pairs and definitely found that fun. Also highly ego driven and there’s an entire “sneaker Twitter” community where people just want to show off. I was mainly into it for the software engineering side of things. You end up having to build really interesting/complex software. My infrastructure was basically half a dozen servers with a coordinator that would scrape websites all day long. Also had to learn how to exploit different features of websites to speed things up. Generally enjoyed it but the community is pretty toxic. Mostly driven by money and ego, no room for collaboration because it’s more profitable to keep things to yourself.

b_tterc_p 8y ago
Selling shovels to gold miners basically. Nice. Can you explain how you find people to sell software too and how realistic your value prop is? It doesn’t quite sound logical to me (and maybe it isn’t?). Your software finds margins of x, but surely only so many people can make use of it before it stops working for anyone.
- moate 8y ago
  I think the bots are being used to buy the sneakers from direct sales channels (Nike, Footlocker, primary market sources) and then you'd flip them on the secondary market. Basically the direct channels will sell the shoes at "reasonable" prices but well below what the secondary market is willing to support so you can walk out the door and immediately sell them for 2X+ what you paid. You see similar things in rare craft beer releases.
- kfichter 8y ago
  Mmmm you typically limit releases of your software for exactly this reason. Best model so far has been subscription based with a limited number of total subscription. I’ve seen it generate a huge amount of revenue (upwards of 300k annually). It’s in everyone’s best interest to keep the total number of bots in circulation relatively low. Helps that genuinely good software is difficult to write and most people doing that work are young/inexperienced - huge advantage to anyone with a strong softeng background.
ronyfadel 8y ago
Hey kfichter, care to share what your stack looked like? Did you use any public libraries (e.g. BeautifulSoup)?

nwhatt 8y ago

Same as collecting anything, stamps, action figures, classic video games. There's some intrinsic value (wearing them on your feet), a story to each item (and possible emotional connection), and then the resale value.

standerman 8y ago

Marketing by Nike. Have you noticed how many pop culture figures wear Nike and Converse (mostly Chuck Taylors) which is owned by Nike? That's no accident.

mikefivedeuce 8y ago
I think it's also a demographic trend. Many of the releases are re-issues from a time when we were kids and wanted to wear the Jordans / Pennys / Grandmamas / Ewings we saw on TV but couldn't get our parents to spring for them. Now we're older with disposable income and, although expensive, for the most part they aren't crazy expensive. I mean, a pair of decent dress shoes cost more than my Tinkers... but nobody has ever stopped me on the train to tell me how dope my oxfords are!