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Over the weekend, Highsnobiety dug up an old interview with Supreme founder James Jebbia from 2002, conducted by Gary Warnett for early streetwear blog Rift Trooper. In the interview, there are some cool tidbits about Jebbia’s love for boxing, a scrapped action figure and the appreciation of underground culture in Japan. For sneakerheads and current consumers, perhaps the most interesting part is his opinion on re-selling:
What’s your opinion on the secondary market of Supreme products (whether it be on eBay or in one of the many boutiques in Harajuku)?
James Jebbia: I don’t like it very much simply because we try our best to make our clothing affordable for young people, after all Supreme is a skate brand and when I do see our things on eBay the prices are normally at least double what they should be. Basically I don’t like people getting jacked for a T-shirt. I much prefer if someone buys something from us that they plan on wearing it and not selling.
There are a few takeaways from this. One, it’s cool to hear Jebbia isn’t big on reselling for two great reasons: it makes the product hard for young people to access financially and it takes away from the joy of actually wearing it. Also, it’s clear that re-selling has been around a long, long time. While it’s nice to have second shots at otherwise sold out product, it gets kinda crazy when product is selling out merely for the intent to resell. We side with Jebbia on this one, just wear ’em.
