Image via Complex Original
If you’re a sneaker head in the UK, you’ve heard of Crepe City. If you’re a sneaker head in Europe, you’ve probably heard of Crepe City. The London sneaker event, now in its sixth year, has gone from strength to strength and is showing absolutely no signs of slowing down.
Ahead of Saturday’s event, we thought now would be the perfect time to sit down with Ron and Morgan, two of the minds behind the whole thing, to see how they feel about the sneaker industry, how they got started, and where they want to take Crepe City in the future. In a candid interview, they show that really, they're just two guys who love sneakers and love sneaker culture.
How did you both get into sneaker collecting?
Ron: I’ve always been interested in shoes, ever since I was young. My parents thoughts were you got one pair, you wore them into the ground, then you get another pair the next year. The other day I was trying to find this pair of Reebok’s that I got when I went to Florida when I was about 12 — I think it’s a pair of Boston’s or Bolton’s from seeing the images — but that was probably the first pair that really got me into it.
Morgan: I think that pops up a lot, doesn’t it? In the scene. When you’re young and you see everything that you want and you don’t have access to it, then you get to an older age and you get into it.
R: I think there’s a lot of people who chat a lot of shit to be honest, saying “oh yeah I’m an OG collector, from 12 I had all these Jordan’s”, and then they start pulling out all these photos and they weren’t a collector, they just got stuff. I had mates when I was like 10 or 11, who would get pair of Jordan’s or a pair of Air Max. They weren’t collecting, they were just getting the latest pair or the most expensive pair. But for me, I’d go back and buy pairs that I’d missed out on, and it grew organically, I guess, and I got a bit crazy.
M: I’d say for me it was when I was in school. There used to be a little shop really close to my house, a sportswear shop — proper sports, not a trainer shop.
R: What, like tennis and shit like that?
M: Yeah, like tennis. And my mum used to go down once a year and we’d get £100 to spend — you’d get a lot for £100 back then, you could get a whole years worth of sports clothes — and they always used to have Dunks down there, and not SB Dunks, just low Dunks — and I remember getting a grey pair and wearing them to MUFTI day [non-uniform day] at school and feeling like a don, and everyone outclassing me by wearing TN’s and shit.
It graduated from that and it went to “I can’t be assed to take you down the shops anymore Morgan, here’s £40, go get yourself a pair of shoes.” So I walked to the Foot Locker and bought a pair of black Air Force 1’s — I managed to get away with them at school, which was a nice touch. Then while I was in college it grew with really odd shit. I used to wear a lot of Bape, and I had a pair of Ice Cream’s, the Reebok ones. And literally everyone took the piss out of those shoes. They were the pink, blue, and yellow ones, and they were like clown shoes. When I started earning my own money I went shopping for shoes and I’d always shop the sales and go for quantity over quality, just getting as many as I could.
R: It’s easy to do that though, until you then realise that space is at a premium as well. I’ve done the same, but then you realise that you don’t wear them very often and they’re just taking up space.
M: Yeah, and they’re not worth anything. they’re just worth stuff to you.
R: Yeah, you can’t even give them away half the time.
M: Yeah. So I did that, and I used to buy a lot of white pairs as well, and if you buy a white pair you always wanna double up, just in case. So I used to have a lot of Super adidas Top 10’s, and all those high cut, mid cut striders as well, and I used to have Puma Steppers. A lot of it was bought from Natterjacks because that was the closest trainer shop.
That’s my ends!
M: That’s your ends? Oh, see, I’m Surrey, so the closest trainer shop you had was Foot Locker in Guildford, which used to sell loads of Timberlands and Pastry shoes — RUN DMC’s daughter’s shoe brand. [Laughs]
R: Pastry? Oh bruv. [Laughs]
M: Yeah. They also had TN’s and stuff, which I wasn’t really into that much. Or you could go to Natterjacks which used to have more skate shoes, more sportswear sort of stuff, so I always used to go up there. So yeah, that’s what started it for us. You definitely went big time in uni though.
R: Yeah. I started to have a bit of money so I was buying what I wanted. Initially I was buying Air Force’s and SB’s around 2002 or so, and probably for about three years I was buying SB’s, a few Air Max’s and things, and slowly changed my focus. I started working in 2007, and I think from then I was trying to pick up the bits I’d missed out on before. I got my Supreme high Dunks and things like that, Atmos Air Max 1’s, just buying things that I really liked but never really had the money to justify buying them — or even knowledge of where to go to get them — when they first came out.
Do you think that’s a big part of sneaker collecting now? Do you think that’s changed?
R: It’s changed completely. Now you’ve got 13 year olds and they’ve got everything and they’re reselling. They’re buying a pair, putting a picture up on Instagram and then selling it or doing trades, and it’s like some free-flowing economy now. You could pick up a pair of rare shoes, and if they were like a library book and had a record of where they’d been before, you’d see the names of ten people you know.
M: I think the whole landscape has changed from what we used to know it as. It was never seen as a cool thing to have shoes, it was a proper niche hobby. And now, it’s almost like as soon as a kid hits 13 they’re going to school, seeing their friends in Jordan’s and stuff and then saying “Mum, I’ve got to have these.” and it’s so they can stay on-trend. Whereas before, it was kind of like we made our own trends.
R: I’d say that when I was at school people were saying they needed Jordan’s and stuff — I remember when I was in sixth form everyone was getting on Presto’s and stuff like that — but now it’s almost like there’s a whole resell element to it in schools and colleges as well. That didn’t really exist before. I remember, even when the Yeezy 1 and Yeezy 2 came out, it wasn’t like that; it was pretty much adults buying the shoes, or maybe sixth formers. Now, with the 750 Boost and 350 Boost, you’ve got 13 year olds getting their mum to go and buy their pair and they’re stunting with it and then trying to sell them for £30K or whatever. That was unheard of.
M: But there’s no other thing you can do at that age to make the sort of money you can make with shoe selling. Everything else they want costs loads of money and there’s no legal thing they can do, they can’t gamble or any of that sort of stuff, but anyone can walk up to a shop, buy a pair of shoes for £100 and if it’s a really limited pair, anyone can put them on eBay and make £3–400.
R: But it’s buying a pair for £100 and thinking just because it’s a Jordan and you’ve been told it’s limited that you’re suddenly going to sell it for £300, and it’s just not really how it works. It’s changed a lot, probably in the last 2–3 years, it’s really gone that way which is really weird.
M: It’s sort of imploded in on itself.
there’s no other thing you can do at that age to make the sort of money you can make with shoe selling
With that amount of money floating around, do you think it’s almost weird that such young people are involved? Most of the people getting those shoes you know you'll make money off are kids now, do you ever see it being an adult hobby again?
M: It is weird, and it’s frustrating because I’m perfectly happy to talk to anyone, but I feel a bit weird being bent over a barrel by a 13 year old who wants to sell me some shoes for £700, you know? It’s just a different world nowadays. You rarely can actually sit down and have a proper conversation with them, it quickly devolves into “LOL nah I’m not gonna sell them I’m gonna get loads of money.” I think you had that recently, didn’t you?
R: Yeah, you get that all the time. But I think it’s just the case now that it’s become a lot more, not mainstream, but more widespread, and with that, people now realise what shoes sell for. For years certain shoes have sold for a lot of money. I remember the Quai54 Jordan 5’s were £100 or so, and they were going all day on eBay for £250, but nobody really clocked that they were just sitting there on the shelves for a month. Whereas now, a shoe like that, everyone knows that those sort of releases will sell for a lot more money, so everyone’s hungry and they’re on it. It’s just a case of the early bird catches the worm. A lot of these kids, if they’ve got time, fair play to them. And do you really want to be camping outside in a street or an alley in Soho for a pair of shoes when you’re 25, 30? Or is there better things to be doing with your time? You might pay a little premium for it but it’s just how it goes.
M: We’ve all done it. We’re not new to camping, it’s just something that, now, I wouldn’t even want to go out past 8 o’clock to be honest. That sounds really lame [Laughs] but I can’t imagine anything worse. It’s quite a good time — I’ve gone to camps and just chilled for an hour or whatever, not caring about getting the shoes — but I couldn’t think of anything worse than camping. I like raffles. I think properly done raffles — automated raffles — are the best way to go. I just think it’s fair for everyone, everyone gets a chance.
R: I think there’s an argument for everything. If you do a raffle, and you aren’t very committed, you can get them. And you can rig them. Some stores realise what’s going on and others don’t, so any system can be manipulated. I was gonna camp last night for the Supreme Jordan’s; I got home at 10pm and was on the phone to Morgan and there was twenty people in the queue, I was really tempted to go, but then..
M: Then there wasn’t twenty people in the queue [Laughs].
R: Five minutes later, I checked and there was fifty people in the queue. and I just thought “do you really want to go and stand out in the cold all night, do you really want a pair?” I think it’s just a risk now, there’s a lot of people who behave badly in these queue situations. I’ve queued before, and been number 20 on the list, but then all of a sudden fifty people get in before me, and it’s not for want of trying to tell them to get to the back, but it’s power in numbers really.
M: London’s definitely got a weird queue vibe.
R: Yeah, so is it even worth it sometimes, for the hassle you might have to put up with?
Is there an argument that at some point there has to be an ethical code that develops, even with the younger/newer guys?
R: I think the problem you have is that there are always people who act outside of the code. We’ve had things which have been put on our page about people going and bullying people in queues. There are people who will happily think that they can show their face for five minutes, go home and sleep in their bed and then turn up on release and push in.
M: That’s what’s annoying. I hate that.
R: But I remember before, being in the queue at Supreme and they’re trying to decide who’s going in, and if you’re standing next to the wall, you’ve been here all night because that’s where you’ve stood. It’s the people who are standing really far away from the wall, or close to the front, they’re the ones who haven’t been here, the queue has developed and suddenly they’re right on the side, trying to push in.
M: I think the opposite of that, that the people who are ethical, they tend to prosper a lot more. You notice a lot, the same people will help each other out, and they’ll keep getting helped out and they keep getting hooked up and that’s a really good thing. If you’re gonna do a good deed and help someone, it’s like karma.
R: It doesn’t go unnoticed. We’ve seen people on our page who’ve hooked people up and we’ve sent them pairs of shoes, to thank them for being a good person.
M: We had the guy who made the flag and stand in front of the Kanye West set at Glastonbury, and when you watched it you could see the Crepe City flag, really big, and we had so many people tweet us and hit us up. So we sent him a massive care package.
R: It definitely doesn’t go unnoticed, and I’ve even seen brands do it with people. They see someone doing nice things and they’ll send them something. Also, if you help people out they’re inclined to look after you sometimes.
M: Yeah. We’re in a lot of American groups — I’ve got a lot of American friends — and they seem to have lots of little pockets out there of cool people. I think our groups and our scene, there’s a few bad eggs but in general everyone tends to stick together and it’s a lot tighter and that’s why these problems always look bigger than they are. We all take it so personally. But yeah, in general, it’s hard camping out now, it’s not a fun one. It’s just down to people’s internet connections, like today, a lot of people missed out, but a lot of people who couldn’t make it got a pair, so it’s just what happens. We are hitting every note today [Laughs], you’re getting a good interview. Candid talk.
our scene, there’s a few bad eggs but in general everyone tends to stick together and it’s a lot tighter
Do you think that because the UK is so small, in comparison to America, it helps foster a nicer scene?
M: Yeah.
R: It’s true. There’s only probably three Facebook communities in the UK worth anything, with any credibility; ours, the Basement and Sneakerheads UK, and I think people are very visible on those pages, and when shit happens people realise very quickly.
M: We set up the rules basically, we were one of the original groups, and we set all of the “you can’t sell this if it’s just come out, if you’re gonna be racist or offensive or whatever you’ll get banned.” etc.
R: But it’s the same, if you go and misbehave somewhere in a queue then there’s groups of people from this pages, and they’ll make sure that you get told you can’t behave like that, which is nice.
M: Self-regulation.
R: I went to the Yankee box logo release and there were guys from the Basement making people pick up their rubbish that they were dropping in the street. It’s stuff like that. But also, everyone really knows each other as well, if you go to a queue for the Asics Gel Lyte III 25th anniversary release every month, it’s the same people every month. You know who’s there and it’s self-regulating. The retailers end up knowing who’s there as well and they’re going to trust the guys they serve every month.
You mentioned the Facebook group; did the group spawn the event or did the event spawn the group?
M: Ahh, the event spawned the group.
R: Well, first of all was the forum, the KicksXchange forum, and then the event was about two years after, because there was a lot of planning. Then we needed a group because KicksXchange got deleted from the servers, so we made the CCS KicksXchange group. We had a page already which we didn’t realise people were using to chat anyway, it was just meant to be a ‘Like’ page, and we turned that into the chat page.
M: So, that’s our chatting place and then we have the buy and sell forum, so we’ve got two. The forum we had before was really popular, we had a really good forum that Ron set up.
R: It was very basic, but it was just for buying and selling. It was basically like Klektbut really basic and there was no scamming and bullshit because everyone knew everyone; it was predominantly people who posted on Crooked Tongues or people who had a vouch to get in there.
M: Because they didn’t have a buy and sell on Crooked Tongues did they?
R: Nah, that was why we started it. Crooked Tongues didn’t want to set one up, I think because they imagined there would be loads of problems, so we thought we’d do it ourselves. We didn’t know anything about running a website and that was our downfall in the end, the company who hosted it went bust so it all got taken down.
M: But yeah, those Facebook groups, you’ll see all the key members of the community pop up in them, and it sounds really weird talking about Facebook groups, but that's what it is now, that's peoples chosen way to communicate to a lot of people.
R: I think forums are dead now, sadly. We’ve paid a developer to make one for us but I’m skeptical of whether it would work. The thing is, everyone is on Facebook all the time now, it’s almost like it’s the homepage on your computer. You turn your computer on, you look at Facebook, you almost do all your internet through Facebook. And it’s a shame in a way, because everything is now run by them and it’s hard to pick things out from there, so it’s not as easy to run or anything but it’s just where it is now.
Do you think Facebook almost brings up more difficulties in running a group because it’s so public? Look at the Basement and its 30K members and the fact that huge jump happened in what, two months?
M: I think you could literally have a full time job adminning a Facebook page now. Especially one that’s the size of ours; keeping everyone in line, making sure everyone sticks to the rules. But then there’s a double edged sword with that, you don’t want to come off too strict, otherwise it’s not a fun page.
R: That’s the thing as well, that loops back to the UK being small and everyone knowing everyone and then they’re messaging us asking why we’re being strict, and it just gets to a point where there’s got to be some order on there, or it becomes a free-for-all.
What about at your events, is it harder to police some of that behaviour?
R: Do you know what, a lot of people chat shit on the internet and then they come to the event and they’re as good as gold. We’ve had guys taking shots at each other and saying that they’d see the other at Crepe City, and then they came to the event and they were shaking hands. We’ve had a guy trying it with me and Morgan and then he came in and realised he was smaller than Morgan and it was all hugs.
M: All hugs [Laughs].
R: I think that sometimes people take things out of context online, then they’ll meet at the event and they’ll realise that actually, he’s just a normal guy.
M: The events are such a focal point for passion about sneakers. If you’re going to a Crepe City event, you know about sneakers and you like sneakers and you want to be there. You can feel it in the atmosphere, you could literally talk to anyone in that event, everyone loves it, and if there’s people who don’t get on with each other it never really raises itself at the event; they probably just won’t talk to each other.
R: It’s the same with the people selling shoes, it’s normally all good. Very rarely someone might have a pair of fakes or something, but it’s the same with any event, you just have to regulate it. We try and check everything but it’s a lot of shoes on a lot of tables so...
M: Yeah, that’s always a really important issue to us. We’ve had it very, very rarely but apart from going round and checking every table which we try and do there’s always gonna be somebody who can bring something through the event in a bag or hide it from us, so it’s just one of those things. Thankfully, as the community is so tight, if someone spots something we get told straightaway and they will either get removed or we take the shoes.
Have you seen the new community of replica collectors? It’s a subreddit and it’s apparently really popular in the states.
M: What, and they collect replicas?
Yeah, because they think “well, they’re basically the same and they’re so much cheaper” etc.
R: I’ve not heard of this, it sounds terrible.
M: I’m gonna check this out, but for me, it’s just, if you can’t get the real thing, don’t buy the fake thing because you’re basically trying to be something that you’re not.
R: Exactly, wait until you can afford it. We can’t all afford everything and, you know, are you a fake person? You’re wearing fake shoes, so it’s like you’re fake yourself.
M: There are plenty of other shoes for £50 that are fucking awesome, you know?
R: Just wait. Wait until you can afford what you want. You’re just undermining yourself, you’ve got no integrity, it’s nonsense.
M: Right, so Yeezy’s retailed at £220, there are a lot of shoes that are really better than Yeezy’s for £220.
R: And you’re only buying them to keep up with fashion and trends anyway, but you’re doing it the wrong way. And you can tell because these replicas and fakes, they’re not the same quality, they fall apart, I’ve seen it with my own eyes. I know people come with these stories that they’re the same shoes that get stolen from the factories, but it’s not, it’s a different shoe.
M: I’ve never seen a 1:1 fake. I’ve never seen a fake that could compare to a released pair over here. I’m pretty certain that we could spot pretty much anything. Obviously, they don’t care about the shoes as much as we do, and there’s plenty of people out there who don’t. They want to look like their fashion idol or something like that and that’s fair enough, but they maybe shouldn’t be coming to a sneaker event wearing that sort of stuff. Yeah, down with fakes. I can see why people might do it, but there’s a lot of shoes that they can afford that people might consider a lot better.
there are a lot of shoes that are really better than Yeezy’s for £220
Right. The first Crepe City event was in 2009, how did that come about?
R: I think we just wanted to put something together where like-minded people could meet up and have a good time, and at the same time lots of people had shoes and wanted to sell them, but were struggling with eBay — I think the fees had all gone up recently — and it was just a weird time for selling stuff. So we thought let’s do something where people can get together, sell shoes, try and track down their grails, and the aim was to really have the most pairs of shoes under one roof, anywhere. The first event was small but I think it achieved that goal. It’s just been a case of stepping it up from there, trying to have more pairs on the tables, better brands each time, and more stuff for people to see and do at the events. It’s been a really nice, natural progression, really.
There is a palpable growth when you go to each event, you can always feel that it’s bigger than the last, has it shocked you how quickly it’s grown?
R: In a way. It was very stagnant for the first two and a half years, I’d say, but then, we didn’t really take any risks. So we were putting on the events in free venues and keeping it low-key, and then eventually we started to have some personal cash to be able to invest in the events and pay for bigger venues and more things for people to do at them. I think that’s what some people don’t really realise, they probably think we’re a big company, when it’s ultimately three guys who’ve been doing things in their spare time and trying to use their own money to try and put things on. We’ve not been getting paid from it or anything, it’s all been a labour of love really.
M: I think that until you understand events and how they work, you don’t realise how expensive everything is, how much time you have to put in, and it’s very easy to say something on Facebook, but these guys put their lifeblood into this thing. I think a lot of people see that, and are really happy to get behind it. but it’s like when everybody spends a little bit of money on a ticket or something, it all goes towards the event.
R: It’s always key to try and make the event better. I know that for this one lots of people wanted mobile phone chargers, so we looked really hard to get those lockers in, but it turned out it was really expensive, and it wasn’t cost-effective. But there’s other things that cost a lot of money but are worth doing, you can’t do everything at once.
M: There’s definitely a lot on show for everyone this time. The space is bigger, the queuing is faster, everything like that is improved upon. We always ask for feedback, what the weaknesses were, what we could work on, and we read everything and try and do everything. I think that’s such a benefit of our social following, we can put a question out there and get a hundred replies straight away. We try and make it work for everyone.
Is there anything big that you really want to do with Crepe City but maybe is a way off?
M: Shoe launch.
R: Also, to get our own collab launched as well.
M: Collaboration is the gem, isn’t it? We’ve seen other events do some mediocre collaborations or customs but they’ve never really done it for us. I think that if we did a shoe it would be a fucking awesome shoe, and we’d get feedback straight from the community throughout the process, so I’d really like to do something like that.
R: It would also have to be something that we would wear, not just some nonsense.
M: Yeah. I think every brand has got a sick silhouette, and I’m happy to spend time doing time on those silhouettes, but if it didn’t come out how we wanted it, in any way, then we would just park it and wait until something does come along. We’re quite patient.
R: I think as well you have to think, this is an event with 5000 people attending, and people are loyal to the event. So if we can do a collab with a brand and put something out that’s really cool and looks amazing then people will buy it.
M: We’re happy to wait, we’ll just keep trying. The big thing for us this event is clothing.
R: Yeah, we’re dropping our first clothing collection.
M: People are always asking us for clothes and we never wanted to drop anything shitty.
R: We wanted to put a lot of thought into it and put out something we were proud of.
M: Sneaker clothes are shit, I’m just gonna say that. Sneaker clothes are shit; if you’re trying to tie clothes with sneakers, it normally comes off really shit. So we tried to do that without falling into that trap.
R: I think also that a lot of people see it as a way to make money quickly. That’s not how it should be, so we’ve tried to do our best to make it sick. We’ve learnt about all of this stuff, using people that we know and learning about how the process works.
M: Yeah, we learnt all that this year, and we’re gonna be learning more next year about clothing, definitely. We just wanted to do something really limited, really tight, because we used to do event shirts and at every single event people were asking about them, people even tried to buy them off our backs.
R: Yeah, they were always for the friends and family of the event, and the staff, so to thank them for coming they got something exclusive. It’s not about not wanting people to wear the brand, it’s about wanting it all to be spot on before it goes out there, we don’t want to start selling something that we’re not proud of.
M: Perfectly put. So yeah, the clothing is a big jump, I don’t think any other events have really tapped into that so well. Of course we’ve got a really good relationship and exclusivity with the Basement, those guys always smash that sort of stuff out of the water, and we’ve got another collaboration with them.
R: A really cool collab with them.
M: Yeah, that’s a cool touch, it’s really nice that we could help those guys get off the ground and they returned and helped us as well. We’ve got probably the most amazing collaboration with Ropes Laces, that’s gonna blow everything out of the water.
The last one was pretty sick.
M: On a scale of 1 – 10, the last one was a one, this is a million times better, it’s amazing.
R: Again, it’s just about being proud of it, putting time into it and attention to detail. We’re also trying to work on something with Jason Markk as well.
M: Yeah, that’s really cool. That’s a first. With the Jason Markk one it’s more about doing stuff that the brand hasn’t done before and also, we wanted to make something that was memorable. We get on really well with the guys at Gimme5 and Jason Markk, so it’s really nice to have those guys back again. We’ve also got a lot of stores coming.
R: Yeah, Attitude Inc. are coming for the first time, Soleheaven are coming back in.
M: They’re all pulling all the stops out, doing some crazy stuff. We do really good for independents. I think for independents, they get their name out there and get recognised; the event is pretty much like the number one networking day for people in footwear in the UK. I think they see that as a massive bonus, they can show that they deserve a top-tier account or whatever, so they’re really happy to come along. We really like to keep that UK feel to it, we’re proud to be British, so we like all of our collaborations to be centred around that.
R: We’ve got goodie bags for the hyperstrike ticket holders which is sick. Part of that is going to be the magazine, that’s the biggest thing.
M: That is one of the best things we’ve done. It’s awesome.
R: Really, really proud of it.
M: It’s really thick, and it’s got a tiny amount of adverts in it, and it’s all content and it’s all really informative, it’s all community-based content. It’s all stuff that you could use to learn about stuff, and it’s timeless. We wanted to have something for the community, something that gets the community out there and shines a light on the UK. I think we get overlooked a lot when it comes to global scene, so it’s almost giving the people that get overlooked a place to have as their own.
R: Telling new stories as well. I think it’s very easy to fall into the trap of going and interviewing the same person that everyone has interviewed before, and it’s very boring. We want to hear different stories, from people who haven’t courted limelight for years, but actually have a sick collection and a sick story to tell. We want to look at that side of things.
I think we get overlooked a lot when it comes to global scene, so it’s almost giving the people that get overlooked a place to have as their own
M: We really enjoy that; the stories behind the shoes. We wanted something physical in the shops, and I think having Crepe City in print sort of officialises everything even more. We’re getting better, we’re getting older, we’ve been doing this for a while now, so this just makes everything official. Really excited for it, and it’s going to be stocked in shops, internationally. It’s going to go to America, it’s going to go to Europe, and that’s a really big thing, we’re really happy about that, so shouts to Alex [of The Daily Street] for putting that together. That’s going to be included with the hyperstrike tickets, so if you’ve got one of those you get the magazine straight away, and the first issue is limited, and available to buy inside the event.
R: With the hyperstrike tickets, you get into the event early, and you get a lot of stuff, and in all it’s worth a lot more than the additional ticket price, and it’s another way we’re trying to give people additional value so that it feels worthwhile to them. It’s something for the real hardcore guys, who like having those things to take home and keep like the tote bags and little goodies. Morgan loves that sort of thing.
M: Yeah. We’ve got the quickstrike tickets as well, which allow you to get straight in at 12, so you don’t have to queue. There’s re-entry as well, so you can go out, have a look around Brick Lane, and come back in. Who else is coming to the event? Stance are coming.
R: Stance are coming, Schuh are coming, they’re doing a sneaker giveaway.
M: Schuh is quite an interesting one, they’re a global retailer, so for them to come and tap into the sneakerhead market is quite interesting and we were happy to help them do that. What else? Mugs! We’ve made Crepe City mugs. The Basement room is looking sick, there’s still the boutique zone, which has girls sizes.
With rooms like that — and also with the addition of people coming in and selling clothes — how curated is that by you guys?
M: Very.
R: Yeah, we still try and keep control over it. Less so with the Basement, because that’s what their community is about, so they know what they’re doing.
M: Whereas, with us, we still like to give people the chance, but it’s a sneaker event first and foremost.
R: Yeah, so we make the number of clothing tables very limited. We’re not just going to let everyone come, it’s not there for someone who’s just decided to go and screen print some T-shirts on a shit blank and come and try to cash in. If you’re that guy, it’s not for you, go to a market and do that. That person isn't going to sell anything anyway, because you’re dealing with people who are fashion-conscious, they buy brands like Palace, they buy brands like Supreme. They spend a lot of money and they buy cool things, they’re not just gonna go and buy any shitty T-shirt.
M: We aren’t their litmus paper. They shouldn’t be using the event to test their brand, basically. The tier of brands we’ve had has been great, we’ve had Trapstar, Playdot, ADYN...
R: ADYN came loads of times, and now they’ve become massive.
M: We’ve done some really good things with British brands, helping them get out there and stuff. As I said, we’re always happy to have clothing brands there, as long as it aligns with us and fits our values and themes. It also depends on whether we have the space, because we’re always rammed with sneaker sellers. Sellers now come from America, which is crazy because they have to ship all their stuff over too, people drive from Europe.
R: From Europe we’ve got people coming from as far as Hungary, and driving the whole way, which is a mission. There’s someone coming from Romania as well.
M: Jeeeeez. Yeah, they travel because they know that it’s the place to go and sell your shoes. They’ve been to all these other events and — I think because we’ve looked after it so well — Crepe City has managed to keep busy and keep people there. The prices are always good, you can always find a steal on a gem.
R: Also, I think it’s really important that while some sellers might price things high, it’s because it’s a starting point for a conversation. You shouldn’t get put off by a price, make an offer. People come and they fill their car up with their shoes, they want to sell stuff so there’s space in their car going home.
Do you see yourselves ever taking Crepe City international?
R: Definitely.
M: Never say never.
R: Paris or Amsterdam, I’d say. Or Berlin. But we need to get what we’re doing over here right and spot on, and then get over there and do something; create a platform for UK sellers and brands to get overseas, I think that’s really important. And to just spread what we’re doing further. It’s hard work to do something overseas but it would be cool.
