What happened
On Wednesday, May 24, Nike opened the “General Access” sale for its first ever non-fungible token (NFT) sneaker via its dedicated .SWOOSH Web3 platform. The “First Access” sales started on May 15 for .SWOOSH community members.
Each NFT costs 19.82, alluding to the year of the Air Force 1’s debut. Despite not selling out like its usual sought-after sneaker drops, the brand has sold over 71,000 out of the 106,453 “Our Force 1s” NFTs, raking in over 1 million in sales.
The First Access sale was originally scheduled for May 8 but was delayed due to technical and traffic issues, with .SWOOSH tweeting that it needed some more time to produce a “seamless” experience.
However, according to reports, that goal was not achieved. Due to high traffic, the site was constantly crashing during the First Access sale, which led the minting process to take more hours than ordinarily necessary.
By May 16, Nike was forced to extend its First Access sale because of technical issues. Due to these complications, sales were much slower than expected, with around 83,000 NFTs still available by May 22.
On May 25, the sports giant praised the sale as a success via Twitter, stating that it had sold more than 55,000 OF1 boxes to 30,000 unique buyers.
The Jing Take
Despite technical issues, Nike’s first .SWOOSH drop has been a success, reflecting consumers' continued interest in NFTs.
Evidently, there is high demand for digital assets within the sneaker space, so much so that Nike needs to improve its system to handle the level of traffic. Seeing as the brand’s SNKRS app is so effective at managing an extreme number of visitors at one time for limited edition releases, consumers expected more from .SWOOSH.
The level of excitement surrounding this first NFT sneaker on the Nike Web3 platform proves that there is still untapped digital and metaverse potential for brands. In fact, it shows how Nike’s acquisition of RTFKT has bolstered its reputation within the Web3 community and solidified its pole position among the traditional brands stepping into that space.
The Jing Take reports on a piece of the leading news and presents our editorial team’s analysis of the key implications for the luxury industry. In the recurring column, we analyze everything from product drops and mergers to heated debate sprouting on Chinese social media.