Rares, the alternative asset marketplace for sneakers, has launched secondary market trading on its platform beginning with the 2010 Air Force 1 “All Black Everything” sneakers by Nike and Jay-Z.
Launched in April 2021, Rares allows users to buy and trade shares of rare sneakers. The new secondary market trading, according to Rares cofounder Gerome Sapp, enables users to sell shares to each other “and increase the liquidity of their holdings.”
The 2010 Air Force 1 “All Black Everything” sneakers were created in celebration of the International Basketball Association’s World Basketball Festival in 2010. Five pairs are set to auction on eBay, with 100 percent of the proceeds benefiting the Shawn Carter Foundation’s Scholarship Fund.
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“When we created Rares, it was our mission to open the upside of the sneaker market to anyone — especially those who helped build sneaker culture, but were often excluded from its benefits,” Sapp said. “With the launch of secondary trading on the Rares platform, we are furthering this vision, becoming the go-to platform for sneaker enthusiasts and alternative asset investors alike. Through Rares, anyone can realize the upside of the market by trading shares in sneakers without needing the funds to own a shoe.”
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Sapp, in the same month it launched Rares, acquired a Nike Air Yeezy prototype sneaker from Sotheby’s for $1.8 million, which set a new record for highest-priced sneakers. The sneakers were worn by Ye, then known as Kanye West, at the 2008 Grammy Awards.
Months after the acquisition, the company secured $4 million in seed funding from MaC Venture Capital and with participation from Cake Ventures, Portfolia Rising America Funds I and II, Evolution VC, W Fund and Gaingels to be put toward product, inventory and team expansion.
Sapp said Rares does not share the overall number of users on the platform, but that the current number is “within our projections of where we’d be at this stage when we launched Rares.”
He added, “We do not have any [year-over-year] numbers to share at this point because we have only been offering IPOs for less than a year. However, we have seen healthy IPO activity on several of our IPOS.”
The company revealed that more sneakers will be made available on the secondary platform, like the original Air Jordan 1 sneakers, the Nike Air Ship and the Apple Sneaker designed and issued specially for Apple employees in the early ’90s.