It’s officially March now which means it’s one of the best times of the year for sports. That’s right, I’m talking about March Madness and the NCAA Tournament. Supposedly billions of dollars will be lost due to dips in productivity to watch your school lose to a 12 seed on a bad three point foul call, not that anyone here in Richmond is bitter or anything. Since college basketball is on the brain and more and more schools are signing exclusive shoe contracts let’s take a little bit and get into the basics of sneaker collecting.
People that collect shoes, or sneakerheads as the young people would call them, collect them for all sorts of reasons. Some of them do it because they like a particular player, some because they want to expand their wardrobe options, and some because they see them as a way to make some money at a later point. So rule number one is to know why you’re collecting.
Once you’ve got an idea in your head of why you’re doing it, you have to figure out how you’re going to go about buying. This mostly means determining your budget for shoes. Most shoes start at about $100, but some are resold for thousands of dollars to other collectors. You also need to have a strategy for what you are and aren’t going to buy. Some shoe lines like Lebrons or Kobes will have over twenty colorways, or specific color combinations, in a given year. Do you want to plan to buy twenty pairs of shoes or are you okay with just having the colors you like? If you’re trying to have a complete set, are you ok with trading or selling shoes in order to get rare shoes that you missed out on? There are whole communities out there dedicated to sneaker trading. Much like any other collectible hobby, it’s really easy to end up sinking a ton of time into sneaker collecting so keep that in mind before you start.
Once you have your shoes, how are you going to store them? Are you planning on wearing them? Or are they going to live in your closet? Proper care is the most important step in keeping them looking good and retaining any value if that’s your end goal.