Discussion-Was-Only-a-Matter-of-Time

Earlier this week catalogue images for the 2012 Air Jordan XII Retro lineup were featured around the web. While being able to purchase one of my personal favorite sneakers one more time, something was brought to my attention that just made me cringe.

We have already been dealt a $10 increase on Retro products which will continue into early 2012. Ten bucks… not that bad when you think about it I suppose. However, it is the retail price attached to this new wave of Retro models that has me a bit irritated.

If you didn’t know, the look book images had MSRP’s for GS and Men’s sizes. The MSRP for the Men’s Jordan XII Retro models set to release in 2012 had been noted as $199.95. Yes, you read that correctly… $199.95 for the Air Jordan XII Retro next year…

To be honest, my first thought after seeing the price was “greed is overshadowing the legacy”. After giving it some thought I’ve come to the conclusion that WE are the cause of all of this… and by “we” I mean all of us; Sneakerheads, resellers, blogs and most of all… the early sellers.

With more early sites popping up and selling sneakers months in advance, one thing is drastically obvious… we as consumers are impatient and frivolous. We pay ridiculous amounts of money for shoes to be sent to our door months prior to release date. Not only do we purchase these shoes early for insane prices, we receive products that are not authorized by Nike/ Jordan Brand… what does that mean? It means that every pair bought from an early site goes straight into the pocket(s) of some person that has no direct affiliation with Nike/ Jordan yet is allowed (by those who run the factories) to obtain pairs of poor quality for bargain prices. Once a pair is purchased that money was potential profit that Nike/ Jordan are missing out on.

Here is a brief example. The Air Jordan X Retro in the OG Chicago colorway is already for sale on early sites. These shoes will retail for $160 come January yet are listed anywhere between $250-400 per pair depending on the site/ seller. None of the revenue earned by the sale of the early shoe goes toward Nike… So, if there are groups of individuals willing to pay nearly double just to get a shoe early… why the heck not charge more money for the actual retail products? Business wise, it would be foolish not to increase prices to maximize profits if others are doing it, especially if said people are doing it with your product without your consent.

Now, in the future, if an early site gets their greedy little hands on a size run of early production pairs and decides to sell them off… they would most likely increase their prices as well to keep up with the inflated prices set by Nike. This would hopefully cut down on the number of products sold early thus forcing consumers to purchase directly from authorized retailers in order to obtain their products, which is exactly what they want and exactly how it should be.

This shouldn’t affect resellers too much, although the prices we pay to resellers have also been a good indication to brands that we are willing to pay more while they initially charge us less.

Being willing to paying $175 for Bins, YOTR and Ray Allen PE’s hasn’t exactly helped us either.

Overall, we as consumers have brought this upon ourselves. We as blog/ news sites have also caused this to escalate… if it weren’t for us using the early seller’s images to show you the product(s) in advance, they wouldn’t be a popular option to purchase sneakers.

Was the price listed on the images false? Possibly a typo… I sure as heck hope so. If it isn’t… we can only look at our own reflections and lay blame upon ourselves.

In a previous Discussion I called us all “Air-heads”… we’re about to be floating sky high.


Discussion-Was-Only-a-Matter-of-Time

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33 Comments

  1. Ur right they prices are getting stupid, but as long as we keep paying they will never Come down

  2. Several good points, good article. JB is certainly paying attention to trends. Kids/ new sneakerheads paying thru the nose for average product and GRs is killing the hobby too. Personally, I kind of hope the catalog is accurate….gives me an excuse to stop collecting. I just can’t quit for some reason, but this would make it really easy.

  3. GOOD POINTS..VERY TRUE..WELL I DONT MIND PAYING MORE, BUT THE QUALITY OF THE SHOE MUST IMPORVE..WHY ARE WE GONNA PAY MORE FOR SOMETHING OF LESS QUALITY??? THE WACK PART IS WE CAN KONTROL HYPES OR THE THINGS HYPES DO 2 KOPP A PAIR..WHICH IN TURN GOT THE COMPANYS LOOKING AT ALL OF US LIKE SOME #WALKINGDOLLARBILLS..

  4. Ummmmmm……..Just thought I’d point out that this could be a catalog for product releasing in Australia or Canada………especially since I’ve never seen a price ending with “.95” in a US catalog.

      1. Yeah…………that symbol indicates the term “dollar”
        So any country that has a dollar (ie. Canadian dollar) will use that symbol.
        Thanks for playing though? SMH

      2. Americans… always thinking the world = America
        Go read a book or something. I can’t believe someone is stupid enough to think that the $ symbol represents USD.

  5. As a former employee of six years, and someone who has been obsessed with Nike products for the last 10 years, i must say i am very disappointed in the rise in prices. I don’t know about anyone else but I am definitely going to boycott Nike for a while. Nike should hang their heads in shame!!!!

  6. How come allways when prices go up or the common customer has to suffer, its allways `òur fault“or has to be that way. So what if people sell them online and make money, they do that on everything. It doesnt mean that a shoe deserves a markup of 75$ in 10 years. Nike has made how much in sales off these so far? How much does it cost to make them? How well do they pay there workers in china or vietnam? So… Nike can cut corners and profit profit profit… and we pay more and more and more… yeah it makes sense. Its our fault for wanting shoes… no thats simple business law… supply and demand. It boils down to who will have less of a concious, the people ripping people off for selling them at such high prices, or the people who plainly steal them… maybe its all wrong.

    1. Using “supply & demand” as reason not to raise prices, seriously? Are you an idiot? Price increases are always the fault of the customer. The idea of any business is to sell the product at as much profit as you can until you reach the balance point of max sales & max profit. If I own a company and people are willing to buy bootlegs (and yes early sales are bootlegs) for $200 over retail & willing buy them aftermarket for $200 over retail then I would feel I am not maximizing my profits. That is simple business law.

  7. Everyone had to have known this was gonna happen. Were being sold paylrss quality shoes for deigner prices. I for one have more of a respect and appriciation for the people that keep there j’s or nikes from when they were priced to match the quality. The og shit was such a high bar that shoe companies set for themselves. Now all they can do is make shoes that have missing stiching or glue comming out the sides, thats all for an example. The biggest issue is the terrible quality in materals. I am never goimg to buy retros or new releases this day forward. or at least until things improve. Charge as much as u want to but put some integraty in to it

  8. The whole reason for paying extra to get them early is to GET THEM EARLY. When you walk down the street with some kicks that don’t come out for months, people in the know will turn their heads. Thats the allure of buying early, but that does not mean I will pay $200 for retro’s when they are officially released. Especially if they are not a highly anticipated pair, like XI’s or the black cement 3’s. Guarantee you that if this price increase is true, you will be seeing a lot more of the lesser hyped retro’s on discount racks. For example, the I bought the 9’s that were retro’d a year ago on the release date for 150, but if they were 200, they would still be in the store. I am already being ripped off by JB by buying lower quality shoes than the ones they made in the 90’s for 150-175 now, I don’t know if I will continue to allow them to rip me off for 200 +…I may switch to all foams, because the quality on them is much better than JB

    1. jordan never released a shoe for 175 iun the 90’s were you even alive in the 90’s to buy a pair??? smh you say u wont buy a pair for 200 UNLESS and that UNLESS is the catch, everyone loves differrent jays so its worth it for them to release a shitload of shoes because some popl wont buy them UNLESS*** those are wanted by that person..

    2. “People in the know” don’t turn their heads when you spend insane money to get shoes early. We look at you like your an idiot for spending insane money to get a bootleg / c-grade shoe early and for stealing money from the company who’s shoes your feening to have because you love them so much.

  9. I’m out of the “game” due to price increases and quality decreases. My pick ups will be through trades and discounts only. “WE” caused it ‘THEY” have jumped on it. What’s happening now will cause the demise of the fun of the game. It’s greed on the part of to many folks. Including to a degree myself.

  10. Sad LoL The Everyday Working Man Can’t Get A Raise And Nike Can What Is That Saying And yet nike saying they lost money smmfh this is so misunderstanding espcially for a sneaker that has been retroed or came out 3 or 4 times in 14 or 15 years ago stripped of its performance aspect qualities and durability i can some what understand kobe lebron but there top quality products but still i dont agree with the prices as much as the next man but im trying to figure this out what money they lost and now its kind of like who cares who has what early people rite now as i type somebody is trying to cop a retro 8 or 9 years ago so it dont make sense paying early knowing later on somebody is gonna be looking for that same sneaker and this maybe a blessing to sneaker heads because they may really mass produce the sneakers and know somebody is gonna pay 200 but not everyone so resellers can by 10 20 pair and think they gonna be flyin like hot cakes dont be surprised when they stuck with them pairs cause when they go on sale they gonna be force to trade or sell the kicks for a lower price then they had envisioned!!! Food for though

  11. its not greed overshadowing the legacy. its nike seeing all the feinds buying 150 dollar shoes for 300 on ebay you dont think nike is seeing this?!?!? resellers are screwing up the game…now you even have lil morons saying “worn only 2x – $250” thats retarded!! how can u sit here and be so stupid to pay over retail for a used product…who gives a shit if its a yotr shoe it still cost less than 2 for you to buy it for 4 or even to be selling it for over that price…if you take a look back when the 6’s started retroing back in the early 2000’s they sold at $125.00 RETAIL now a few years later the same shoe has jumped to over 175? now u telling me that a shoe made of leather and ZOOM air is gonna cost me 200??? lol jordan is capitalizing off of your stupidity u buy a shoe at 300 and then complain about the shoe being 2?? make up your mind…im against jordan and nike putting up the cost like they are for a RE-RELEASE..its the same shoe call it what you want it has the same cost as it did when it first came out maybe even cheaper since the materials are vintage and not really being used anymore…foam and flightposites were always 196 after taxes so they kept it true through all the foams that released…now they are pushing slowly up the prices too…you ppl who dont want the shoe but sit there buy it and resell it for double..need to open a store get an acct and struggle stop trying tyo hustle your not gonna be effective for much longer…one more thing the south beach lebrons has to be the gayest color on any shoe i have ever seen if you are buying it for 500 dollars you should be dragged into the street and shot….jordans been 150 for a while they can go up to 175 and thats cool it’ll keep some of these young suckers out the way n back to buying bootlegs!!!!!!

  12. Just a few points I’d like to share:

    1.SF is right, the raise on the prices is in part, our fault. Were we not willing to pay that much money on kicks, Nike, JB, you name it…wouldn’t have the power to charge $160 for a pair of six rings…just look at reebok, charging $59.98 on the john wall’s because everybody wants nikes…not reeboks.

    2.Nike is such a genius at marketing: just look at the way they’ve been making us drool all 2011 for the concords…what causes this? that come Dec 23rd, any of us will offer their first daughter’s virginity for a pair.

    3. Plausible as it is, boicotting, I’m afraid, is utopic. We all raise our fist (not in the Jersey Shore way) in rage when someone calls for the rape JB is doing to all of us. But when everyone turn their backs, sadly we rocket straight to footlocker.

    4. IMHO, I prefer to wait the time to have a product that at least has a bit more quality control. I kind of think of early releases as sort of fake products, so if I see someone today with a pair of 11’s..well…enjoy…just not my weapon of choice.

  13. what happened to paying min of 120 hell no, no ones gonna pay 200 for the quality they’ve been releasing so far…smh nike

  14. What’s causing this is hype is these sneaker websites, they cause too much hype, Nike reads these websites daily, lets stop these sneaker hype websites and go back to the 80’s 90’s where u would only know by walking into the shoe store that the new Jordan’s came out.

  15. this is why i stick to sneakerfiles instead of filling your site by promoting you continiously speak the truth. im not getting any brand new jays anymore. i cant afford it. i will get the cements and the concords then the columbias but thats it im thru.

    i love nike products and what do they give me.. A straight kick to the gut

  16. The 12s are one of my favorite js, but i really think i will pass on them if theyre gonna be $200. Not worth it, especially for the quality. Even if the quality was up to par, thats a huge increase from the original shoe. I heard of inflation, but thats just crazy! This is a good way to get me out of the game. Besides im getting too old to deal with this BS. The D Rose addidas are a nice shoe for half the price. Im sure the technology in it is better than the retro 12, but we are all infatuated with js…..me included.

  17. Damn, looks like I will b out da Jordan game next year, guess Cement 3’s and Concord 11’s will b my last Jordan purchases…I’ma jus keep it OG wit da Air Force colorways for now on…FUCK U AIR JORDAN but I thank u for showing us dat yall really don’t care about true art of sneakerhead community and in da end it’s all about MONEY to ur company!

  18. From what I’ve heard, the price listed on the catalog is not what is going to be charged, that catalog is meant for Nike rep’s eyes and not our own, and this is the very reason why…they havent even made it to retail yet so there is a lot to be worked on by the nike team. These will be $160, just like the other retro’s dropping next year w/ the exception of the Columbia’s which Im sure will be $180. But, the points made are valid, if we are willing to pay crazy resale prices, why not just pay them from the retailer?

  19. as soon as I seen the Lebron 9’s go on sale for $170 I said this is getting crazy, then I noticed the retro 3’s all year sell for 150 and now the black and cement are going for $160 I knew it was coming.
    These retros are not worth “foamposite” prices and i will never pay that much from NIKE for a retro that I had before for about 115 to 135.
    Kick Rocks.

  20. #OccupyNike?…maybe!!….lmao…i think i am going to gracefully bow out of this sneaker game..200$ for some playoff 12’s is retarded…but on a serious note though!! #OCcupyWallStreet

  21. Can’t agree more with this article, sadly we are the one to blame, if you give them your money, they will take it.

  22. Remember when the first Chris webbers came out in the late ’90s and you were like $160 WTF?!?!! Now look

  23. This really dont matter ppl still gne pay no matter the price…..I know I am cuz jordans r a part of me ng son life regardless of the price …beside if u have a job y complain save early