As rumored price increases became a reality for Jordan Brand in the new year, Nike has followed suit with updates to the retail prices of Air Force 1s, Air Max 90s, and Air Max 97s. These sneaker listings across Nike.com and Nike’s retail partners have each respectively gone from $90 to $100, $120 to $130, and $170 to $175 overnight.
These adjustments come after a handful of apparent policy changes and order cancelations that hit late in 2021. The brand has cited COVID-related supply chain issues in communications to its retail partners, many of which heard from Nike in November that their outstanding Holiday 2021 and Spring and Summer 2022 orders would be canceled. With the brand’s strategic push toward direct, digital sales from the Nike app, it can be assumed that this decision stemmed from the opportunity to maximize profit from their lower-than-anticipated supply. Not only do we anticipate that Nike will distribute fewer products to their partners in the future, but we’re also seeing them make moves to capitalize on their updated pricing at the wholesale level.
All that said, we don’t expect the changes to end there. Another change to look out for is restricted direct purchases from Nike on certain models. In November 2021, Twitter account @DaNikePlugs shared order update emails from Nike stating that a user exceeded the “quantity limit” of Air Force 1s on their account and that they would not be able to process more orders of the silhouette. To date, Air Force 1s sell for an average price of about $16 above retail on StockX. These changes continue to demonstrate Nike’s aggressive direct-to-consumer approach and attempts to combat the secondary sneaker market.
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