- 11,582
- 20,793
- Joined
- Jan 27, 2013
Lot of sites in there I'd never heard of, like kickpredict
Here's part of the article:
"With pandemic stay-at-home orders, athletic footwear sales fell in March 2020 to the worst monthly results on record, said Matt Powell, senior vice president for sports at market research company NPD Group. But in June, athletic shoe sales rebounded to the best month ever, he said, rising 25% from a year earlier.
That’s because people who didn’t lose their jobs — freed of commuting and entertainment costs — had more disposable income and, in April, received the first of the coronavirus stimulus checks. Meanwhile, new resellers looking for a side hustle flooded the business, Powell said.
“They don’t have any allegiance to the brand. They have no allegiance to the celebrity or the athlete. It’s simply a chance to insert themselves into this market and that has caused the price of the shoes to go up for the collector and the true fan,” he said.
To win hot new products, some resellers have turned to automated solutions, which can cost hundreds to thousands of dollars. That added cost only makes it more likely that bot users will strive for even higher prices on their shoes.
“To jump to the front of the line to buy limited-edition sneakers, it is easy to purchase any of the hypebots or sneaker bots available on websites like aiobots.com, hypebots.com or anothernikebot.com,” according to the 2020 Bad Bots Report from cyber-security firm Imperva."
