Nike SB Heineken Legit Check

So I am a bit weird on these... I have compared to other photos but I am not good enough to tell from pics. Also the thing thats weirds me out is that there is no box.

Cheers

Hi AntiClimb1 and others,

Heineken had a limited amount of customised Nike Dunk Lo's release in June 2003, and they were sold out immediately. As far as i know, there have not been any more releases since. There was a similar Heineken customised sneaker release in 2011, but that was based on the Reebok Omni Lite Pump hi-top. I've read somewhere that this Reebok release was very limited indeed (only 20 pairs, probably meant as relational gifts amongst Heineken employees or very large appreciated customers). On the Dunk release i have no figures, alas. Right now i am answering your thread on an iPhone 5 and the pics you added, are displayed rather as small postage stamps surrounded by a lot of black, so i cannot see much detail. I will try to find out more on the web behind my laptop, with better picture formats. I've never seen shoes on offer in Heineken's official merchandise webshop, nor in the shop in their former Amsterdam brewery, which is now a museum.

By showing us the pics you probably mean that they belong to a seller wanting to sell a pair, and that you want dependable info on authenticity upon which you may decide to buy.

The first impression is good. The sixth pic is probably from the insole. The shade of green and the white details match the colorways that Heineken used in their cans, bottle packagings and advertisement materials around 2003. The shoes in your pics look the real deal, but if they were not, how would you manage to make them if you were a counterfeiter, cashing in on the Heineken issue's rarity?

First option: have them made by Nike themselves, through the ID-program. You order (say) 50 pairs of original Nike Dunks in this specific shade of green and white livery, from Nike, for 100 bucks a pair to flog again again for 250. Then you would get the shoes but never get this particular Heineken stylised insole on backorder, nor the decal of the white trimmed red Heineken star imprinted on the heel, as these are registered and protected signature details You would have to identify as a Heineken manager with a certain amount of representational clout to have Nike apply Heineken trademark details on order. So, having genuine Nike Dunks in the right colors in your possession, you would need to hunt for additional parties to make the insoles and star decals for you, which would greatly add to the total manufacturing costs, deminishing your own profits. Wouldn't pay off, i guess.

The second option is a totally illegal reproduction, but again: would that pay off? Would any Asian counterfeiter handle measely orders of a hundred pairs or less? Because you can't all of a sudden flood the sneaker world with an issue that has seen only one original very limited release in 2003, which was gone within a few werks, to never return. What i mean to say is, the Dunks in your pic might as well be real. But i'll have to do some comparison checks first. I'll get back to you.

Oh, about the box, that certainly must have been something special, knowing Heineken. Alfred "Freddy" Heineken was very keen on publicity and effective, clever marketing. He went to the US for a good education on marketing psychology and product appearance styling. In the Heineken name you will notice the slightly tilted letters "e", in which the horizontal line is slightly curved. That's one of Freddy's own ideas, the e's look like they're having fun, in a party atmosphere. In a way he transformed the letters a bit into smileys, long before text emoticons were invented. I never saw a Heineken Dunk box live nor in a pic, but i can't imagine that it was just a standard Nike box. Freddy passedcaway in 2002, but his successors share his keenness on clever publicity, so they would probably have interfered in this project in person, wanting the special Nike-Heineken cooperation and its limited number exclusiveness to be splashed out on the box in a spectacular way.

Greetings
Ger
The Netherlands

Golly,
Back from the web after a quick Heineken themed sneaker search. Far more has been going on than just the Dunk Lo and the Reebok Omni hi. I've seen some sort of fake All Star, three versions of Air Max 1 (one with a bottle cap attachment to the tongue and the red star on rhe heel at the back, one with a star on the tongue and one at the side of the heel and one with a green tongue label), a Roshe Run version and several types of cheap low sneakers. I live near Haarlem and i am in Amsterdam a lot, but i never saw a single one of this on the street, worn by either city inhabitants or tourists. So there are probably other channels than Heineken that are allowed to make these versions, with Heineken's blessing (after having paid license fees, probably, or under some contract to pay Heineken part of the sales proceeds). Nike themselves may have issued third party branded sneakers like these Heineken ones on theit own accord - as license holder- in several limited version, which would explain three AM1-versions.

The stars were not decals or print ( ad i believed earlier) but are embroidered, like the wings on Jordan type Dunks.

I gathered some pics, i hope they turn out ok. The second pic shows the box containing the first batch of Heineken Dunks, which is indeed green and Heineken styled, but i also saw Heineken Dunks on the web that came in regular Nike boxes. All very intriguing; right now Dunks are for sale from both sellers known to peddle fakes or sell genuine stuff. Very confusing, i now know what you mean! To be continued.....

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Back with more. Articles on SneakerNews and other channels talk about Nike getting in trouble over the 2003 "Heiny" Dunk issue, as Heineken had not given official license permissions, and rumour has it that Nike had to halt production immediately after having made some 4000 pairs. Which is probably a false flag to create a "clandestine atmosphere", making Heineken/ Dunk fans want these shoes even more feverishly. So many more than 4000 may have been made. The original was made from white leather, green suede and a black suede swoosh. In the Top 10 list of most wanted limited edition Dunks ever, the Heiny ranks 6th place. Prices of up to 450 USD have been spotted. These are probably from collectors selling part of their collection. Underneath is a decent pic of a Heiny Dunk and yet another pic of a Nike/ Heineken branding experiment. I think this whole limited fairytale is just a big merchandising scheme and that Nike has an ordinary ongoing contract to use Heineken branding and has a certain freedom to apply it to several shoe models. I haven't visited the "Heineken Experience" in their brewery/ musuem for long time, as i found it horribly commercial amd my favorite beer is Grolsch anyway. But i wouldn't be surprised if, in their museum shop and merchandise corner, there would be this touch screen device on some pedestal, allowing visitors to choose from several Heineken styled Nike shoes and order them at NikeID and have them delivered at their homes. That would explain the large variety of versions, in spite of the fact that so little about them is published in mainstream sneaker news media. I think it's an exclusive thing reserved for Heineken Experience visitors only, except for the Dunks, who were released mainstream by Nike themselves.

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