The (not so) subtle art of scum-baggery
Yeezy Red Octobers go "missing"
I got my first job - through my mom - when I was 13 years old. She did the majority of the financial operations and bookkeeping at a very busy, popular, restaurant in Lake Tahoe and figured that it’d do me some good to start bringing in some bread during the summers when I was a teenager. I started out as a busboy and ended up bouncing around from station to station, learning all about how an extremely successful restaurant works. I worked at this restaurant every summer and most winter breaks until I moved to New York. Through the years, I worked in almost every back of the house position in that restaurant - busboy, bar back, dishwasher, food runner, expediter, prep cook, wheel cook. I skipped the whole ‘waiter’ thing and went straight into the back office and started counting money, paying folks, and setting up financial (and web) systems. And still, to this day, I get calls and emails and consult for them on a semi-regular basis. I’ve basically been working on and off in this restaurant for thirty years.
I took that job almost comically seriously, mostly because I was representing my mom, plus, I just didn’t really know any better. I thought - if I do a bad job, surely I’m going to get fired. I didn’t know that many people just plod through life doing a shitty job and never end up getting fired. And I didn’t really know what getting fired meant, but I knew it wasn’t a good thing. And no matter what…I did NOT want to get fired. Ever. I don’t know why that was such a big thing in my mind, but it was. I had no control over it. I was addicted to doing my best.
Throughout the years, I worked with some ridiculous people. I got a chance to work with my best friend for a couple of years as I was able to pull him in for a job. I worked with a guy named Boston who was from Denver. And I worked a guy named Vince who flipped his Mazda Miata going 80 trying to run from the cops…and he came in for work the next day with 40 stitches on his face. I worked with an ex-soap opera star…and another really famous celebrity’s daughter (she was a babe). I worked with multiple playboy bunnies and ex-soldiers and ex-convicts and rich kids and normal kids. A handful of them are still around - a handful of them have worked at the restaurant for the better part of 40 years. I love catching up with everyone when I’m back in town. But all of this to say…I met some interesting people.
This one dude…his name was Tom…and…I didn’t know much about Tom other than the fact that he was always walking around with a goofy smile on his face, but this one time he revealed some information to me that just blew my mind.
If you’ve ever worked at a restaurant, you probably know that you’re not supposed to be eating on the clock. It’s just not a good thing to do. It’s a sloppy look. But every once in a while, we’d be working super long shifts with a very short break - so sneaking in bites every once in a while was customary. Bites. Not meals. Everyone would do it. We’d snag a single piece of bread, or a few fries, or a couple of croutons, or a couple of oreos or nuts or something…nothing major. Just bites.
But I never really saw Tom snag any bites. This one time, I asked Tom - ‘man, how come you don’t seem like you’re ever hungry?’ He looked at me, smirking, and said to me ‘that’s because I’m not.’
‘Why?’ I asked. If I could have the answer to this I’d be the best, most efficient employee on the roster.
‘Because I steal that shit.’
‘Huh?’
‘You know when the food is sitting there up in the window waiting to be picked up? If no one is looking, I just snag it and stuff it in my pocket. I eat it when I get a minute alone.’
‘Huh?’
He looks at me with that stupid smirk and says ‘watch.’
From our busboy station in the back, I watch him walk over towards the food window…no one is around…and he literally plucks the chicken off the top of a chicken burger and stuffs it in his pocket. A fucking grilled chicken breast in his pocket. Then he walks back over to our station with that goofy smile, pulls it out of his pocket, and gobbles it down in about 3 seconds. I peek over at the window, a waitress grabs the plate (to bring to her table) and walks out to the floor.
What. The. Fuck.
It took me a couple of days to process what I had witnessed and by the time I was set to share a shift with him again, he was gone. Left or fired. I don’t know.
Throughout the years, I’m sad to say that sometimes my mind isn’t all that productive and I actually HAVE wondered about that chicken burger. Was the plate sent back? Did the customer just eat what was on his plate? Did the customer complain? Did the waitress look down and notice something was missing and bring the plate back immediately and ask the wheel where the fuck the chicken for the chicken burger was? Did the wheel go home that night asking himself ‘how in the fuck did I forget to put chicken on a chicken burger?’ Did someone else see Tom swipe that food? I didn’t have the peace of mind to really understand what I witnessed…but whatever it was…it bothered me. That was the first time I witnessed scum-baggery in a business setting on the part of a minimum wage-earning employee. And, for better or worse, I think it changed my tiny worldview.
You might remember, a few years ago, this little company called ‘StockX’ popped up in the sneaker space and they made these grand promises about ‘peace of mind’: ‘We will authenticate every single shoe that comes through our doors.’ Right. A novel concept, sure, but impossible in my view. Depending on volume, how could anyone guarantee that? Fakes were gaining steam at that time and most people had no idea how to authenticate. Most still don’t. I hate to say it, but I was kind of waiting to see what would happen the first time they failed to live up to that promise.
The first time I saw it - I believe it was on Twitter and I believe it was a pair of Yellow Pharrell x Adidas NMD Human Race’s. Some dude had purchased a pair from StockX and got an obviously fake pair. I remember the tweet saying something like:
‘I don’t know who the fuck a Josh is but I’ma need this motherfucker to answer for these piece of shit fakes they just sent me.’
It was true. Based on the pics, the fakes were bad. And that was even before most of us knew the difference between real and fake Pharrell’s. But they were so obviously bad the question in my head was like ‘how stupid are the people they are hiring?’ It was kind of like a train crash - I really wanted to see how they responded and how they fixed it and how they moved forward. And, I gotta say, regardless of the obvious hubris (thinking you could catch them all), I empathized, as I’ve been in that situation before. My response in the situation is usually ‘ok, can you prove it? ok cool here’s your money back.’ Their response was similar, from what I recall. There was a bit of a public statement released and from that point on I think it was a bit more in view. FB groups popped up, hashtags, etc. I started noticing a lot more people at least talking about fakes passing through StockX. And I know they had some behind the scenes meetings to mitigate what they could.
An aside: I’m fascinated with the whole ‘StockX’ and ‘fakes’ conversation. Because I have NEVER thought what they promised to provide would be possible. I’ve told many people about the time Josh told the world he was going to catch all of these fakes and my first thought was ‘no you’re not.’ But StockX has been riding it since day one. So any time it comes up, I go in.
To get a clearer picture for this post - I re-watched Josh Luber on Full Size Run and I was kinda shocked at how hard Welty, Dad and Dunne went after Luber. Luber took it all in stride. Last couple of times I watched it, it was just on in the background so it was all audio. But actually watching it and watching the body language…it seemed like there was a bit of tension that I didn’t notice before. When it came time to ask about fakes passing through…I found this part VERY interesting and watched it 2 or 3 times. I wanted to get this number right because I think I blew it on the podcast - I think I said 5k pairs a day with 99.8% success rate. The actual numbers Josh used were 20k pairs sold a day, with a 99.85% success rate. And this was more than 2 years ago. And keep in mind - that’s only pairs that they actually caught. So the number of shoes passing through is likely higher, and ‘super perfect’ reps are probably higher, so probably everything is a bit higher. And fakes are still making their way through. Interesting numbers, though.
Luber also pointed out that a lot of people have quite a bit of interest in blackmailing StockX or making them look bad and, again, I somewhat empathize - they definitely do have a much bigger target on their back(s) than GOAT or Flight Club or Stadium Goods or even eBay. For whatever reason. But that makes me wonder whatever happened to the dude who claimed he listed 100 pairs of Fake TS IV’s and stated that 88% of them passed authentication (I don’t know if there is any way to verify this info but there was definitely a compelling screenshot that accompanied his story that I haven’t been able to find). Anyway, as for Luber, you can watch the queued up clip below:
It is worth nothing that Luber no longer works at StockX…but I think he still offered the most *public* transparency into their corporate culture. No one else is really out there addressing the questions so I think this is the best we can expect.
Earlier this week, someone tagged me in a Twitter thread that brought ALL of these memories back…apparently, someone sold a pair of Yeezy Red Octobers and soon after received an email saying that the shoes were accepted…and soon after that received another email saying there was no Yeezys, but only a ‘random pair of shoes’ in the box:
Well. First off. Benefit of a doubt. There is really NO way you or I or anyone but the seller can truly verify or even prove ANY of this information, so keep that in mind as I sit here and write about it….I certainly cannot prove any of this and I’m not making any claims on the truth whatsoever. But if this is true, can you imagine what’d be going through your head right now as the seller?
In the early days of StockX, they pulled in a very popular authenticator to work for them. Probably one of the first and only dudes known for authentication on the ‘gram. His posts were very educational (#iykyk) and…although I never met him or talked with him in person, he was always cool with me in the comments and DMs. Pretty sure he posted @thesneakersavant on my behalf a handful of times, too, so I’ve got nothing bad to say about him. He had beef with a few others online and I know he had a bit of a spotty history in the space, but he and StockX seemed to be in a mutually beneficial relationship. I don’t exactly know what happened (I know some of the stories, actually), so it’s not something I can really speak on, but they had a bit of a falling out and this dude scrubbed himself from social media and ended up leaving StockX for good a little while later.
One of the things I heard about him was that he would sometimes grab the chicken off of the burger - and lots of people I know literally saw it - but his bosses never said anything to him. Essentially, he’d show up wearing fakes and swap them with real pairs on the floor. Or he might even just grab shoes off the floor, put them in his bag and claim nothing was in the box. I heard ALL kinds of stories from several people that I absolutely trust - this type of stuff happened and happened often - not just with him but with others as well. This was independently verified to me through several people I know and trust. Mostly because there weren’t really any systems in place to stop it from happening. Again, there’s no way to prove if this is true, but…for some reason…it just doesn’t seem like a stretch to me. Knowing what I know about corporate America and people, it’s not all that crazy of an idea.
Postal workers sometimes swipe packages. Employees at sneaker stores backdoor shit all the time. Restaurant workers steal alcohol and food. When I worked at Bear Stearns they told me that they didn’t have paperclips at Bear Stearns because one year they calculated that they spent $45,000 on paperclips and realized they had nothing to show for it. I’d venture to say that more than most employees steal stuff from their employers ALL THE TIME. It’s when it becomes a pair of Yeezy Red Octobers that it ruins it for everyone else. The fact that people like this exist in TRUSTED institutions really tarnishes a brand.
And now that StockX is - for better or for worse - a seemingly ‘trusted’ institution, who’s to say these people don’t STILL exist there? Who’s to say someone on the floor didn’t just swap the pair out? What kinds of assurances are there that an employee of the ‘trusted institution’ isn’t going to screw the customer? I mean, look at that customer service email above - If I did, indeed, send in a pair of $10k shoes, I would be absolutely furious if I received an email like that in response. On a hundred-dollar pair of shoes, understandable. But on a $10,000 pair of shoes - you better get your manager on the phone IMMEDIATELY and you better start helping me figure this mess out WITHOUT HESITATION. 2 weeks? Come on! You’re talking about a TEN THOUSAND DOLLAR PAIR OF SHOES. The price of a pretty reliable used Honda Civic. And THAT’S the response? Absolutely unacceptable.
And what is REALLY shitty about this whole thing…there’s likely no way we’ll really know what happened. StockX isn’t a public company. StockX isn’t regulated. StockX doesn’t have to report anything to anybody whatsoever. Let alone anything that might tarnish their brand. Maybe the dude was lying…maybe the UPS man swapped out the shoes…maybe someone at StockX swiped the shoes...but what are we supposed to think, as customers?
What do YOU think happened? What would YOU do if you were in this position? What would YOU do if you worked at UPS and knew a pair of Yeezys was in the box?
Yo that right there is fucked up, and worse, people are STILL gonna buy/sell on stockX. Hundreds of thousands of people will have to just dtop all together for stockX to feel the hit.
Quite interesting read