OriginalFook: From Selling Sneakers On Carousell To Becoming A Registered Company

OriginalFook. A name synonymous with sneaker enthusiasts in Singapore has become the largest inclusive sneaker community boasting some famous names and personalities.

What started out as a passion quickly turned into a budding business when the owner decided not to follow the conventional route by joining the rat race.

From its humble origins in local forums back in 2008, OriginalFook maintained a thread for BST (Buy, Sell, Trade) with famous Japanese brands such as Neighbourhood, Mastermind and WTAPS. It then shifted with the times and found a stable platform to continue operations on Carousell.

Unfunded, starting out with only a mere S$200, and following an American business model, the owner started the ball rolling. Each sneaker sale and its profits went into the next shoe and the next one to snowball to what it is today.

Selling sneakers in the sneaker industry requires an extremely cultured eye for what’s hot and in trend among sneakerheads. Foresight and strategy are vital too; the last thing you want is to be stuck with stagnant stocks of unwanted shoes in a warehouse.

Customer Base

The evidence is clear when you look at the company’s business model: a plethora of shoes that are seemingly always in-stock and ready to be worn on your feet within a day.

With the scale of consumers growing larger than before, the owner still takes pride in meeting his customers; an important aspect of his business.

This service helped the business forge strong relationships, and checks are always encouraged as these are the building blocks of a long-term rapport.

Now, OriginalFook focuses its marketing efforts on Instagram. The page is currently thirty-five thousand followers strong, and what is even more impressive is the fact that the account is set as private, proof that it is grown organically.

Fun fact: OriginalFook also outsources almost half of its stock to other retailers in our neighbouring countries, covering four markets in Singapore, Indonesia, Brunei and Philippines.

Connections

At this point in time, you may have questions like, “Where does this guy get all the limited edition shoes from?”

The answer is simple — connections. What people don’t see are the hours of work and meetings that are needed to make this amazing inventory of shoes ready-stocked. Business trips to Europe and America are part and parcel of bridging the gap between sneaker cultures.

Capital

From all the wheeling and dealing, OriginalFook has amounted a substanstial dispensable working capital. In this industry, it can make huge deals involving a large amount of sneakers with a snap of a finger.

With sneaker releases becoming more rampant in this day and age, the humble company has enough to get everything done as soon as possible to uphold its very high standards.

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For the man behind OriginalFook, anonymity is what he wants. Getting to meet the owner himself, I got where he was coming from. In a world where likes can literally drive people to do crazy things, he appreciates being anonymous without putting on a persona like sneaker YouTubers.

Aside from that, he’s all about business. With operations being run within his control online, he can afford to explore other ventures and that has resulted in him creating his own line of sneaker cleaning products. Dare I say, being Singapore’s first, he has expanded his portfolio to encompass everything sneaker-related.

OriginalFook is now a registered company and you can definitely believe it when he says “Authentic else 2x Refund”. So you can rubbish the backdoor and paid Yeezy raffle rumours away, OriginalFook is here for the long run.

When asked to give our readers a few words, all he had to say was, “Expect us to be everywhere.”

OriginalFook: Website | Instagram | Carousell