Sneaker lovers trade kicks like gamers trade playing cards. And now there鈥檚 a , to make those transactions even easier.
鈥淏uying sneakers is a nightmare,鈥 says Slang founder Stephan Varady.聽鈥淭hey sell out in seconds, never even hitting retail shelves, and then they're only available at a huge markup on a fragmented collection of cracks and crevices on the web.鈥
Navigating聽this shady marketplace used to require insider knowledge鈥攁nd a lot of luck. Aficionados would find a pair of vintage Jordans on the web, wire the owner several hundreds bucks via PayPal, and pray the sneakers would arrive.
Varady thinks Slang will fix this model.
Here鈥檚 how it works. A seller posts a description of his sneakers to the app, which simplifies this first step by聽auto-filling shoe specs and pre-framing each image (picture a sneaker-shaped outline to guide your hand while shooting photos).聽He can then share his listing across social media or send a link directly to prospective buyers.
Once the sneakers sell, he鈥檒l get a pre-paid, pre-addressed shipping label (insured for the value of the shoes) via email. Next steps: print it out, tape it to the box, and toss the box in the mail.聽鈥淲e have an integrated escrow system that doesn鈥檛 allow funds to be released to the seller until the package delivery is confirmed,鈥 says Varady. 鈥淪lang has a zero-percent-fraud success rate.鈥
Slang isn鈥檛 the only shoe-centric app on the market. The reigning heavyweight is (which costs $6.99 in the Apple App Store). But we鈥檝e found the later more useful as a digital reference for sneaker culture rather than a marketplace. Plus, Slang is聽free to download.
Varady won鈥檛 say how many people聽currently use聽Slang or how聽many pairs of sneakers have been sold, but he notes that downloads have been exploding ever since the launch in May.
Bottom line: next time you鈥檙e in the market for some聽truly unique kicks, skip the local mall and reach for your phone instead.