How Urban Sneaker Society builds community from influence
Image: @urbansneakersociety
Looking at the number of its social media followers and traction, no one would have guessed that Urban Sneaker Society was created only a little over a year ago. Before it became a community for streetwear, Urban Sneaker Society existed in Jeffry Jouw or Jejouw, an avid streetwear influencer with 40,000 followers.
Long before Jejouw was an influencer, he was – in his words – boyfriend photographer of his then girlfriend. “Men didn’t receive the same response as girls got 4 years ago. There’s misconception among Indonesians that men who take OOTD pictures are gay.” The pretty girls – the first wave of influencers – took the rein. “The pretty girls inspired me a lot. They are the reason why repost pages like OOTD and lookbook exist,” said Jejouw.
Things started to change when streetwear OOTD started to gain momentum in 2015. “There’s a slight decline on the pretty girls trend as the trend shifted from pretty OOTD to streetwear,” Jejouw explained. Publications like Hypebeast and High Snobiety helped spread the trend. The trend further escalated when Kanye West collaborated with Adidas. “I was in high school when Adidas Yeezy came out. No one was talking about it at first but they started to get crazy when someone wore them to school and when Yeezys were constantly posted on social media,” Urban Sneaker Society member Mandy CJ added.
According to Jejouw, the cool kids started wearing sneakers in 2015, but the streetwear craze fully infected Indonesians in 2017. Towards the end of 2016, Jejouw came up with an idea for a streetwear repost page. The page was officially launched in early 2017 under the name ‘Urban Sneaker Society’. Three months after launching the page, LocalBrand founder Sayed Muhammad approached Jejouw for a partnership. It was a smart move since local brands were experiencing drawbacks from streetwear trend as Indonesians shifted their spending towards global brands like Puma or Adidas. Urban Sneaker Society held its first event in March, 2017. The combination of perfect timing and relevant content allows Urban Sneaker Society to skyrocket. USS’ first event managed to rack up 15,000 visitors and 20,000 social media followers. While it was a triumph in the public eye and on balance sheet, behind the scene was filled with madness and panic. “We only had three weeks to pull off an event. I was running around approaching retailers, stores, and brands asking them to sell at our event. People were saying no because they never heard of us. I have to be the host and the organiser because I don’t have enough budget to hire one,” Jejouw recalled. “But I’m glad I held the event last year because the hype surrounding streetwear was at its peak at that time. It was so easy to lure people to come.”
Following the success of first event, Urban Sneaker Society held the second sneakers reselling event in November, 2017. Right before the event, Guess contacted Jejouw to promote Guess x A$AP Rocky collection. The collection launch became the talk of the town. “People were talking about it weeks before the party. My friends even picked out clothes a week before the event,” Mandy CJ recalled. “The collection launch in Singapore was not as buzzy as the Indonesian launch. People were queuing in front of the Guess store! Singaporeans were laughing at us, but at the end of the day I delivered and that’s all that matters,” Jejouw said.
Urban Sneaker Society’s second reselling event didn’t receive as many visitors as the first. It managed to attract 10,000 visitors. Jejouw cited lack of promotion as the reason behind the drop in visitor numbers. However, there were four major brands that joined the event–up from one retailer at the first event.
Soon after, reputation began to spread. BAPE and Heineken approached Jejouw and Urban Sneaker Society to throw a mini live event called USS Live. The six-hour event in April garnered 3,000 visitors. For the third upcoming event in November, the concept shifted from reselling to pop-up. Jejouw received support from the Singapore government for this event. Dover Street Market, Patta, Limited Edition, SBTG (short for Sabotage), Saucony, Adidas, and Puma joined the line-up of the event. State-owned bank, Bank Mandiri, is also sponsoring the event. “This is when I know Urban Sneaker Society has already had real influence.”
The influence Jejouw has over people has to be taken into account. At every event, Jejouw always goes on stage and opens the event with his speech. Jejouw is Urban Sneaker Society. There is no Urban Sneaker Society without Jejouw. It is the kind of leverage that every entrepreneur longs for. ‘I don’t always accept endorsement. I only accept things I like’ is his mantra of success. Jejouw has turned down a-year contract with a global sports brand just because he is more into the brand’s competitor. It is rare to find an influencer who would go the extra mile to maintain his principle. The Guess x A$AP Rocky event, for example, proves Jejouw’s integrity in the business. “I was paid with VIP pass, but you have to invest in your name. It isn’t always about the money. Money is the second most important thing. It’s self-investing your name that is the most important for continuation in this industry.”
Relevancy often haunts fashion business and influencers. With new things and people up and coming, there is no guarantee how long the hype is going to last. Despite the big success in a short period of time, Jejouw didn’t stop with reselling event. In fact, Jejouw has laid out a big plan for Urban Sneaker Society. The community has been registered as a company six months ago in an effort to ensure continuation in the business. Jejouw is turning Urban Sneaker Society into a media and event business. “Like any other event, sneakers resell event will die down. It happens to mall bazaar when Jakarta Sneakers Day and Urban Sneaker Society come in. We know the hype won’t last. There is no comfort zone in this business. That is why I created USS Feed. It is a media for all things cool and relevant. The topic is hype,” Jejouw explained. As for the event, USS will have mini-events spread across the year. “I shortened Urban Sneaker Society to USS so it can be USS Gaming, USS Music, USS Art, USS anything. It doesn’t have to always be about sneakers. We can have annual event with different segments as long as the target audience is the millennial.”
Above all, the most important factor is the people behind USS. Jejouw personally recruited his team through DMs. His team members sometimes recommended people to Jejouw. USS currently has 50 members, including photographers, videographers to influencers. “I make sure everyone gets paid. I don’t want video editor ‘helping out’ at USS. Helping out means he or she doesn’t get paid. I want to build a healthy ecosystem. I want this to be a professional business.” The influencers Jejouw recruited also benefit from the ‘Urban Sneaker Society’ name. “I had people come to me and ask ‘are you from USS?’” Kent Hadi, USS member, said. “My followers count before I joined USS was at 3,800. It has gone up to 10,000 after USS,” said Mandy CJ.
If people ask what makes Jejouw so influential, we’ll say it’s his work ethic. “I dare say that 70% of my posts is organic content. Only 30% are sponsored posts,” said Jejouw. Even so, it’s hard to tell apart which is sponsored since the posts are smartly captioned and photographed. Take, for example, the Studlace post. It has 500 comments on the post. Needless to say, the campaign is a success. “Endorsement is a tricky business. I have to create unique post for endorsement or else it won’t work.”
3,413 Likes, 745 Comments - Jeffry Jouw (@jejouw) on Instagram: "STUDLACE APA YANG SUKA BELAJAR? 💵 * * * * * * *PS: yang bisa jawab dapet sticker supreme sama satu..."
Lastly, Jejouw added, “Don’t turn everything into a job. Social media is supposed to show your personal life and yourself. You will lose authenticity if your social media content is all about work. Don’t let endorsement dictate when you have to take picture and where you have to go.”