Marie Odinot, the Nike Footwear Designer who developed the upper of the Air Max 270, the first 100-percent lifestyle Nike Air shoe, shares four details behind the design.
Source: Breaking Down The Air Max 270 Upper
Nike just launched a breakdown of the upper of the Air Max 270. The shoe is the first sneaker Nike has launched intentionally for casual wear. This is significant because the brand has always created with the athlete first mentality. The 270’s use of Air as a comfort ride places the model in direct competition with it’s lower tiered offerings, but at a 150 pricepoint the shoe is in premium cost area. That’s not what this is about. I used to follow different analysts on Twitter. I stopped following them once I realized that my working knowledge of the footwear industry is supported by almost 15 years of experience in retail and production as well as some serious experience in the grey market. As I began analyzing my own data and I realized that my micro to macro breakdowns were spot on and the predictions I made were developing consistently into real actionable events, I began to notice a pattern with these analysts that younger sneakerheads follow.
The pattern?
- Introduce information to inspire discussion
- take that information and utilize in presentations that garner payments from sneaker brands.
- The most glaring issue were the constant flip-flops by analysts. When it benefits the discussion sneakerheads don’t matter. When it benefits another point they have scarcity (which is a direct comparison to sneakerhead culture since the analysts always argues that sneakerhead shoes aren’t commercial) will win for the brands.
What I’m saying is stop arguing with Matt Powell and start building your own discussions. What does the man really give you other than what shoes sold the best? Is that information all important? Not really. He has never listed designers, creation processes or given you the keys to start your own business, he simply curates data and if you are bold enough you can do this on your own with the results listed by ecommerce platforms like eBay. It may not tell you the top selling sneaker, but really what exactly does knowing what sold last quarter help you with? Any sneakerhead with a computer realizes that every holiday season Nike is going to outsell everyone with the Jordan 11 and that Under Armour is going to struggle, or that adidas is hot for now.
The constant banter you create would be better served on your own sites because the proof of brands interest in sneakerheads is become more evident everyday. Nike’s latest launch comes with another direct reference to sneakerheads:
During investor’s day a lot of the discussion dealt with the importance of the sneakerhead community and how Nike could accommodate them. They even gave the community a term that will be used to discuss them:
Sneaker Obsessed – Sneakerheads – Foot Locker and the Nike at Foot Locker experience with nike trained sport experts. Sneakeasy will work in conjunction with Foot Locker and will launch this holiday season.
I have to admit I used to look to the analyst for a lot of information, but I realized the more I wrote with evidence the less it seemed that he was as in tune as I thought. I may be wrong. I am not telling anyone to find like mindedness in the sneaker community. I’m saying find differing positions by searching instead of looking to an analyst who doesn’t have any respect or willingness to discuss the influence of sneakerheads. By the way the community is much larger and older than he understands and this is a major issue with brands who look to him for analysis.
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