Nike pre-released its Air Jordan III ‘Tinker’ sneakers on Snapchat with same-day delivery after the NBA All-Star game. The sale was only available to attendees of a Monday afterparty following the NBA All-Star game and through a collaboration between Snap, Nike’s Jordan brand, Darkstore and Shopify, TechCrunch reported.
Attendees of the Jumpman All-Star afterparty in Los Angeles could scan Snap codes to receive the Air Jordans by 10:30 p.m. the same night. The Snap code brought them into the Snapchat app to complete the purchase. The shoes sold out within 23 minutes and Darkstore, an ‘invisible retailer’ startup, made the deliveries.
According to a TechCrunch report: Darkstore works by exploiting excess capacity in storage facilities, malls and bodegas, and enables them to be fulfillment centers with just a smartphone. The idea is that brands without local inventory can store products in a Darkstore and then ship them out the same day.
The official release for the shoe isn’t until March 24, but Nike wanted to do something extra special in celebration of the 30th anniversary of Michael Jordan’s slam dunk in 1988.
“Jordan Brand and the Jumpman represent greatness, so we hold ourselves and our partners to that standard to create distinct and meaningful experiences for our community,” Jordan Brand Senior Director of Global Digital Dan Harbison said in a statement to TechCrunch. “To execute on that, we worked with some of the industry leaders in this space. Snapchat had an existing partnership with Shopify to create the frictionless commerce experience, so we felt that would make sense. We had also talked to Darkstore and liked their same day delivery solution and learned they had partnered with Shopify in the past, so that became an easy decision.”
