StockX and the Ideals of Authenticity

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Stockx is in trouble because they don't know what authentic shoes actually are.

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We're going to talk about it this time on Fire Footwear.

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Welcome back to Fire Footwear, everybody.

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As always, this is your host, Matt Fraits.

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I hope that this finds you well.

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And I want to thank everybody who has stuck with this podcast from beginning to now to the middle.

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It doesn't really matter.

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Y'all are really great.

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And I just want to say thank you as I'm continuing to go through some hard times.

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But I will tell you that I'm going to be headed home, back to the studio pretty soon.

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So this is all going to change, and we're going to get back to our regular cadence.

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But I did want to put out an episode this week because I wanted to talk about this whole thing with Stockx and really as it relates to the idea of authenticity.

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Now, last week, I talked about DJ Clark Kent.

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I talked about his passing, and I talked about what that meant to the culture.

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And I think it's very important to acknowledge the fact that I think the idea of authenticity in the way that I think that it's very important, kind of originated from DJ Clark Kent.

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And over the years and decades that he's been involved and over the decades that sneaker culture has evolved, I think the idea of authenticity has changed.

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And where does StockX fit into that?

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Well, it's a little complicated, but I think on the surface, or at least overtly in the news, Stockx was sued by Nike.

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I think it was a handful of years back, and I'm pretty sure I did an episode on that at some point.

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And I'm sure Sock Jake has talked about that in detail.

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I know he has talked about it on Twitter.

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So if you're looking for the real nitty gritty details definitely go to him because as I always say, he's doing some of the best work in sneaker content out there.

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But the idea was that Nike tried to put fakes through StockX authentication process, and they failed.

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And that's where we are today.

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I believe in court, Stockx copped to the fact that they don't know really how to authenticate shoes or they don't know with 100% certainty whether the shoes that they pass on are 100% authentic.

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And that is really a problem.

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So this all kind of goes back to the idea of authenticity, but it also goes back to the idea and the presence of fake sneakers in the culture.

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Fake sneakers have always been around.

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They have been around for decades, and they have changed over those decades, I think the perception was that fakes were bad because of the fact that they just were bad.

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They were quality bad.

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And I think nowadays that has changed a lot.

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I talk a lot about the rep market, fake market, whatever you want to call it, because I do think that it holds a very specific place within this culture because I think that it represents kind of sort of what makes sneaker culture.

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I don't want to say bad, but I think what makes it a little bit toxic these days, because I think what it represents is the ability to have availability of all of the shoes that you want.

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And the idea that you can get anything that you want at a super high level of quality for the most part, makes it so that you don't have to worry about anything that happens in sneaker culture.

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You don't have to worry about whether shoes are going to sell out.

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You don't really have to worry about anything.

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And I think on the surface, I used to believe that that was okay because that we should all have access to shoes.

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But as I've been doing content more, and I've talked about this before, I think that my views have changed on it.

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I certainly am not going to stop wearing the ones that I own, but I have definitely stopped engaging in that space the way that I used to.

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I still think that it's very important to have my fingers in on that particular space because I think it's important to see what is happening there.

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Because I do believe that fake shoes, I do believe that the fake market does tell us a lot about what is happening in sneaker culture.

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And I think when you look today, you see that many people are still buying the same things from five, six, seven years ago.

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You don't see as many fakes of things that are coming out now.

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And that is indicative of the fact that the culture has changed.

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It is indicative of the fact that the economics of sneakers has changed to the point that we are so oversaturated with shoes that we don't see them the way that we used to.

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Maybe that will change with the new CEO.

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I know that they're going to go for more exclusivity, which is going to drive up hype.

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But resell has been around in the way that we know it today for a little over a decade.

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I would say resell always did exist.

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It just existed in a much different way.

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People did that on the side.

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At the advent of Craigslist, you were seeing a lot of people trying to sell shoes on Craigslist, and that turned into Facebook marketplace.

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Prior to that, you'd had message boards, you had ebay, the early days of ebay.

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And that's how people would swap shoes.

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Nowadays, if you want to pay resell, it is as easy as picking up your phone, clicking a couple of times, and paying what the going rate is of a shoe.

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And the going rate in a lot of cases is way higher than the actual retail price of the shoe.

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Not to sound like Bob Barker here, but that's where resell has kind of become another part and embedded into this culture.

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And it's a very polarizing aspect, Much the same as fake sneakers are in the culture.

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People see resell basically black and white.

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You either love it or you hate it.

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I think there is a lot of gray area, There's a lot of in between as to what resale means.

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But resell has changed a lot in the way that we know sneakers today, and that is because I talked about last week when it came to authenticity, about the idea of authenticity, of wearing what you like and staying authentic to who you are as an individual, especially within this culture, to not just to conform to hype and trends and wear what you like.

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I think that the market has evolved in a way that we are allowed to do that a little bit more, because it's not just jordans, it's not just dunks, it's asics, it's new balances, it's crocs, even.

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There's a lot of options.

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But still, resell exists because within this culture, hype and celebrities, within this culture, they drive a lot of what people want.

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Travis Scott, even though he's come out with so many silhouettes, his shoes still sell.

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They probably always will sell.

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Ama maniere has been seeing a downturn in their sales, and there have been a lot of ama manieres.

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They don't seem to hold the same gravitas as Travis Scott.

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There are just people within the culture that are going to sell shoes, period.

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There are just shoes that are going to be hyped, and they're going to cost more on the resale market than anything else.

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And when you really think about it, it's capitalism, and it's really what the market drives.

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Things are what people say, that they are worth what they're willing to pay for them.

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And so while at the beginning I saw resale as this evil, I think it's a necessary evil within this culture.

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But it's twofold.

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Because when you go to the resale market, no matter what your income situation is, no matter what shoe, it is that you are looking for.

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Your hard earned money is going into buying this shoe.

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And it's no different than if you buy it from Nike or New Balance or Adidas.

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You want to make sure that your money, however it is earned, goes towards something and you know that that product is coming back and everything is on the up and up.

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And so When Goat and StockX get involved, there is a middle person or a middle section of this transaction that now is involved in a way that you really don't have transparency with.

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Goat, StockX, even eBay, they send these shoes whenever they are sold to a third party who authenticates them.

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They have given us very little insight into what that authentication process looks like.

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There are other sites, I think it's Check Check, it's called that you can actually put pictures of a shoe and that you can get it checked, basically.

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And I know that a ton of people in the fake market like to put their reps up there to see if they will pass.

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I don't like that because to me it seems like, well, what is your next step?

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What are you going to do with that?

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Because when you start messing with people's money, when you start telling them that something is what it is, not when their money is involved, then I think that that is nefarious.

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I know when I've purchased fake sneakers that they are fake sneakers.

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I know that my money is going toward that.

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But now when I look on ebay or when I look at StockX and goat, I'm a little hesitant because I don't know.

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And so now fast forward to this lawsuit and StockX essentially telling the world we don't know whether things are 100% authentic.

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And my man Devontae, the Mac ISM effect is his podcast.

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You should listen to it.

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Listen to what I said about Walmart and StockX partnering up.

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And I said that the idea that I was really concerned about was whether people were going to be able to go and buy these shoes through Walmart's marketplace and that they were going to know that they were 100% authentic.

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And I think even Sockjig talked about the fact that it was going to be a lot of people who maybe wouldn't have access to StockX or maybe were intimidated by StockX or goat going to Walmart and having Walmart be another intermediary in that transaction.

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But those people, because they're not knowledgeable about the culture, they're not knowledgeable about fakes, they should be even more taken care of.

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And that's what worries me so StockX is one of, or was one of the biggest players in resale.

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The millions and millions of dollars that has been traded around because of shoes going on the secondary market and these people getting a huge profit off of what is sold, that to me should come with the idea that, you know, 100% that you're getting what you pay for.

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And as time has gone on, you've heard more and more stories about people getting shoes that seem to be fake.

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Not every shoe has a super, super easy tell, but if you are comparing to a retail pair many, many times, it is very obvious.

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The differences are subtle on feet, but they should be very overt in hand.

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And for StockX to have been around this long, for StockX to have so many shoes passing through their authentication process and to now tell the world via Nike and this lawsuit that they don't know what authentic really is, that's a huge problem.

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Now what does it mean?

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Does now the microscope get put on Goat in this way?

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Does it get put on ebay in this way?

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Your microscope as a buyer should always be on other marketplaces that don't even have this third party authentication, because you just have no idea.

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It's the wild west.

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But is Goat now under scrutiny?

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Is ebay now fair game for scrutiny?

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I think that they are because I believe that resale is still something that needs to happen so that people can feel hyped about shoes in a certain way.

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And maybe it needs to be regulated.

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Now how do they regulate it though?

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And that's what I was saying about my man Davante is it's like what is authentic?

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What does that actually mean?

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Objectively?

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It means that this shoe was produced by Nike, all the trademarks, everything that goes along with that and has gone directly to you.

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You should know that.

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But how do you tell that if you're stock X, how do you guarantee to your customers that that is the case?

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And I think this is the linchpin now where we're going to be severely looking at resale culture and looking at how we 100% regulated.

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And it almost feels like the only way to regulate this is that Nike, Adidas, Puma, whatever the brands are, that they have their own secondary marketplace that drives these prices.

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I think we need to start thinking about getting rid of StockX, getting rid of Goat, getting rid of these third party individuals and platforms that aren't 100% sure that what you're getting is worth the money that you're paying.

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And think about it.

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Think about all the people that have bought from StockX over the decades.

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How many of those people got fakes?

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How much money was spent collectively on those shoes?

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That means something to me because in order to keep the integrity of this entire culture, everything has to be on the up and up.

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I, as a podcaster, have told you and been very transparent about the fact that I am mostly a fraud.

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I'm not an OG, because I have dabbled in fakes, and I do have some.

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But I think by being transparent about that, it's letting you know that I'm not somebody who's trying to be something that I'm not.

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And stock X, by not knowing this is inadvertently making it so that they are something that they're not.

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They're not a trusted platform anymore.

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We're seeing the stock go down.

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I wish that this would trigger something drastic.

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I hope that we as a culture and the businesses behind this are going to take a really hard look at how we regulate this.

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I don't think that these companies should stop people from spending the kind of money that they spend, because I think that is their choice.

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But what I do think is that if they're going to spend that money, they should be 100% sure that what they're getting is authentic.

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And I think that that now comes down to Nike and all these other brands to take care of us in a way that they really haven't over the years.

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Before we get to the end, let's get to release of the release of the week, where I like to highlight a shoe that catches my eye.

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It's not always hype.

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As a matter of fact, this week, it's kind of silly.

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It's just something that I want you to know about.

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One of the reasons that I do release of the week every week is because people like to know what's happening.

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And I also like to highlight something that I feel like is kind of off the wall.

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And a lot of times it is off the wall.

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So this week it is definitely off the wall.

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And it is just crazy.

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But if you are of a certain age, you remember how big Scooby doo was on November 27th.

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Going along with the MB04 colorway of Scooby Doo.

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We have the Scooby Doo Puma Suede xl.

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And it basically looks like the Mystery Machine, which was the van that the whole Mystery crew drove when trying to solve all of these mysteries.

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And why do I point it out?

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Well, first of all, I think if you take off this particular colorway, take off this aesthetic, it actually looks really, really cool.

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I love this silhouette.

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I love the old chunky skater vibe and that definitely has it.

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But the other thing that I love about it is it's kind of nostalgic and I think it looks really neat.

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Is it something that a lot of guys are probably going to go after?

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Absolutely not.

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It definitely has a more feminine look to it, but I think that it speaks to a specific part of the culture and that's again, speaking to what I always talk about.

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There is something for everybody and I absolutely love that.

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What are your thoughts about Stockx and the idea that they don't know how to authenticate sneakers?

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Let me know.

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Call the Fire Footwear Hotline.

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Give me your opinion.

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It means a lot.

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I just want to keep coming out with content and I'm so glad that I'm able to do that on a weekly basis.

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Glad to be back on our regular Friday.

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I hope this finds everybody well and safe and fam.

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I'll see you next time.

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This is Fire Footwear.

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The opinions and viewpoints expressed on Fire Footwear are those of Matt Frates and his guest and not necessarily those of the Maddie Ice Media Network.

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Fire Footwear is exclusively owned by Matt Fraits and is brought to you by the Maddie Network.