Why Trainers are a Bad Reselling Entry Point

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I’ll Explain

Reselling sounds fun, doesn’t it? You flog things for more than you paid for them. This may be because you got there first, you were on the right website at the right time, you have a promo code, or because you know a guy who knows a guy. The problem is that, of all the things to resell, trainers are one of the most challenging to start from scratch with.

It’s so popular. Loads of people know someone with a side income from it. As great as that is, my days, it doesn’t have to be like this. If you’re looking for an entry point for reselling, let me please explain why trainers will humble your hustle.

1. Unit Value

Getting started is the hardest part of doing anything new. It’s always the case. Do you know how much harder it is when you’re initial investment is in triple figures? In the UK, most resellable trainers will cost between £80 and £200. Scary numbers, if you don’t know whether or not it will pay off. To make any real money (which many are in denial over), you need to buy in bulk. This will bring people to tears.

2. The Competitiveness

If you are of a certain demographic, you are fully aware that money can be made by flipping the latest trainer releases. With that comes more sellers. These people are probably all trying to buy multiples, while the number of genuine trend-following buyers grows at a far lower pace. Crowded marketplaces are no fun for anyone.

The buyers are also very much aware that some people only own the shoes because they bought them to sell them on. These buyers resent resellers. Resentment isn’t a great starting place for a £200 transaction.

3. Misinformation

We’re clever people, aren’t we. We know better than to jump whenever we’re told we need a ‘must-have’. When you’re in the reselling mind set, though, there are certain trigger-words that mean ‘profit’. #1 Exclusive, #2 Limited Edition. Neither mean a thing here. By no means do they mean they will stay as such.

Yes, exclusives tend to mean that they are harder to come by, but it isn’t to mean that everything stocked solely in one retailer is worth anything. The same goes for limited editions. They may not have many units, but it doesn’t mean that people necessarily want them.

For newcomers, it’s a world full of false promises, where these limited runs (even the well-publicised ones) aren’t guaranteed cash. It’s easy to get misled by false information about how anticipated a pair of trainers really is by the public.

4. Release Days

The launches are horrendous. Let’s look at the off-line version first. You have to queue for when a shop opens at 10am (if you’re lucky) to get what you’re after. Often enough, there’s a one-per-person limit on what you can buy for desirable releases. Ruins your plans, unless you can get some friends to assist.

Online, it’s another nightmare. You can buy from home, making it easier in that sense, but it doesn’t make it any simpler. Online retailers often get flooded with request (usually 8am on a Saturday morning). This overpowers them with traffic (just like when you’re buying Beyoncé tickets on Ticketmaster) and no one gets anything.

This is made even worse because some use bots to buy for them, making it impossible for actual humans to buy them manually. If you’ve gone to all that effort to try wait for people to leave the site and yours get snapped up by a robot, you’re not gonna be happy.

5. The Turnaround

Every Saturday, 5 new desirable trainers could come out. In 4 weeks, those ones have probably dipped in value and are worth nothing but their RRP. It means you have to get the shoes delivered to you quickly (unless you buy in-store), which may cut into your margins. You then have to list immediately, and make sure that you get a price you’re happy with.

If it takes too long to sell your shoes, you’re well and truly stuck. If you’ve bought multiple units, even worse. Sometimes retailers will restock their sell-outs, negating the need for buyers to turn to high-priced resellers. Long.

Even more bad news: if you try to sell them on eBay, and you do it in an auction format, competitors are known to bid high on in-demand trainers to win the listing. They then won’t pay for it, pushing your shoes further and further from when it was most in-demand. That’s their way of trying to mess with your soul, so you leave the game. They can keep making fresh accounts, so it doesn’t impact them at all, while you continue to get demotivated by the whole process.

6. The Scammers

Regular buyers will be aware that they need to be able to spot fake shoes, but resellers have to be able to spot scam buyers too. The buyer has the power with PayPal sales. If you send anything untracked, it’s basically license for the buyer to claim that they didn’t receive it. They then get a full refund, plus the shoes.

You can make a brand new side hustle just from exploiting ebay sellers that don’t track their items, but you didn’t hear it from me.

7. The Research

If you don’t know trainers, it won’t take you long to work out which new Jordans to buy on release day. However, the older ones will require some digging. You will need to look on forums, blogs, eBay completed listings, trainer-exclusive marketplaces and elsewhere.

You have decades of history to explore, to know the difference between OGs and retros, original colourways and new ones, and to know when you’re staring at a fake. There are regional differences in taste, reselling scale and buying trends to factor in too.

8. The Legwork

In order to get a good aftermarket price for your trainers, you may need to be a reliable middle-man to a specific client. That takes effort. Networking, undercutting, dealing outside of PayPal, face-to-face transactions. There are so many risks associated with it.

If you’re going to take all of that time to research, find a buyer, and organise how to do an unsecure transaction, you better be sure that you make some big boy profits from it.

9. ROI

Buy low and sell high. That’s the motto. In mainstream trainer reselling, you buy high and sell a tiny bit higher. Return on investment should be one of the top factors with most reselling. It’s about maximising profits. Nike and Adidas outlets get rid of trainers for cheap, but they rarely have the desirable ‘in’ trainers of the week. Release day trainer reselling and buying from outlets to resell is a completely different game.

Who are the Winners in this Game?

Those that do well in trainer reselling are the ones that know how to source them, before they end up with retailers. If you’re advanced at reselling, and you’re used to buying in bulk from a manufacturer, it would be easier to sell things on through your own ecommerce site.

Some use Big Cartel and Shopify to flog the bits and pieces they have, but are so caught up in the pace of reselling that they don’t see how they could scale it up with a properly branded website. They could become the retailer, but many don’t consider it an option.

Summary

Trainer reselling is retail and online arbitrage. Do you know how wide that all stretches? There are so many categories beyond sneakers. The margins are higher elsewhere, the competition is reduced, and the process is more convenient. There are so many ways to buy and sell products that don’t involve this amount of stress.

The main issue with trainer reselling is that within your first 10 sales, someone is likely to attempt to scam you. If the value of your goods is high, one hit could wipe you out the game. That’s no fun for anyone, especially when there are so many lucrative alternatives.

Maybe you are willing to sacrifice Saturday mornings (and Friday nights) like this. Maybe you know the risks and have reliable buyers to send your stock on to.

By all means, if you know what you’re doing and it works, run through. Go grab that money. If you’re new to reselling, explore this blog, and I’ll find you something safer to jump into.