The BIG FLIP – Am I Happy?

Over this weekend I made one of the biggest flip I ever had over the years in terms of profit on a single sneaker.  I really wasn’t expecting this sale at first because I was planning to give away this pair in our subscription draw.  In fact it was part of the choice in our latest Mag subscription couple weeks ago, but the winner ended up taking the Mags of course.

I was hit up last week asking if I had any DS Nike Red October Yeezy’s in stock and the ask was – IT MUST BE DS with OG all.  I was skeptical at first because very rarely and I MEAN very rarely someone comes to me asking for a DS pair and not a discounted preowned pair.  Fast forward past the details I realized who the end buyer was and it all made sense.   I prefer to leave it at that in terms of  who the buyer was, but if you know me at a personal level…feel free to ask me next time in person 🙂

But here’s the deal…I ended up selling this DS pair for $9,500 USD.  No transaction cost, no shipping…so my profit was slightly under $5k.  It’s funny because this pair came by accident.  Couple months ago, a customer sold me these brand new size 10.5 ROs for a good price because they didn’t have the original box.  Then shortly after, coincidentally someone else sold me a size 10.5 preowned pair with OG box.  So I decided to strip the OG box from the preowned pair and put it towards the brand new pair and BAM! I have a DS with og all Red October Yeezy in 10.5.  Honestly, this sale probably wouldn’t have happened if I didn’t do the switcheroo.

Naturally I should be happy about this flip, right?  $5,000 in one shoe flip that didn’t require much work.  For a normal person, this would be like winning a mini lottery…but very oddly I didn’t really feel much joy from it.  I mean, had this sale happened in my earlier days many years ago when I first started, my emotion/reaction would probably be much different and normal because $5k from that time frame was a lot of money.  Sure the cheque cleared and I am now $5k richer, but the question was…what next?  Last night I tried to reconcile myself to try to find an explanation on why I wasn’t excited at all and I think I found an answer.

Part of me understands that Netmag is officially a business and part of being a successful business is the reliance on perpetual sales happening well into the future and not just today.  As a business I’m not excited how much I can earn today, but more so how much I can earn throughout the lifetime of the business.  Sure this was a great payout, but I knew this was most likely a ONE TIME thing, which meant…it happens once in a blue moon.  A business can’t survive on just a one time payout. It’s great, but it won’t keep the business running.  I could think of so many examples of this…

• Retail stores can’t rely on one hype release to keep them in business and pay the bills.  They need to ensure their everyday business is solid and selling everyday essential sneakers is their important core business that would define their success in the long run

• Resell shops relying on celebrities or athletes to buy from them to keep them alive is also not a viable and long term business strategy because sure you can absolutely finesse them with the highest price possible you can charge and they will pay it anyways…but reality is these are not constant and reoccurring transactions that would keep the business successful in the long run.  They need everyday customers to keep the cash coming in.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s great publicity for the their store, but business is not about how you look…it’s about how much money you can make

I even looked back at some of my earlier day past business transactions where I genuinely felt more happy and successful and they actually came at times where I actually put in hard work and made less.  In my earlier days I once did a buyout for $30k for about 100 pairs of shoes and it took me months to turnover those shoes.  I remember this so vividly because I was still a very small business with a relatively small customer base and stockX wasn’t around and I had quite a difficult time selling.  After flipping all those shoes I probably made like the same amount I did from flipping 1 Red October Yeezy for $5k today.  It’s crazy…how does this even make sense?  Do 100x more work and make the same as just flipping 1 shoe.  This doesn’t feel rational at all from the perspective of many, but it actually DOES make sense! Here’s why…

Though I struggled with selling those 100 pairs of sneakers at first…I can’t deny the fact that I did learn a lot from that buyout.  I learned how to think outside of the box and be creative when my back was against the wall when it came to selling, which means moving the shoes and generating cash flow but staying profitable and not wasting time ALL at the same time.  I developed the skills and experience that would be useful for future buyouts.  I am more experienced, I know how to manage inventory better.  I know what sells and what doesn’t and how I can factor that into my buyout prices.  These are all experiences and skills needed for perpetual business in the future.  I made a big flip off a wealthy person this time, but there aren’t that many people out there like this I can repeat this transaction.  However, there many every day sneaker heads on the regular that are looking to sell their shoes or even sneaker collections AND that’s perpetual business.

I’m happy because I know with my skill sets will bring me future business that will continue well into the indefinite future, but big flips like this Red October….I hate to say it…I was just lucky.  Luck probably might not repeat itself, but hard work, skills and experience I can repeat within my control.  At the end of the day I’m definitely not complaining and I’m certainly not depressed either…come on, $5k can get me 2,500 McDonald’s Junior Chickens…If I were to eat 3 McChicken’s per day…that would feed me nicely for 2.28 years!  So for all you young resellers out there…don’t think short term…think what you can repeat in the long term on a regular basis!