Today we’d like to introduce you to Corey & Allison.
Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
Hello again, our names are Corey and Allison, and together we make CAFlipz! We met in 2018 and instantly hit it off. We started dating while Corey was in his last year of college, and Allison was taking a year off of school. When we met initially, we did not have much to our names. Being both college students, it was sometimes difficult to get by. After Corey’s graduation, COVID hit, and Corey started working from home. At this point in life, it was the first time he felt financially comfortable enough to invest money into a few pairs of shoes to resell. It started out as a hobby but being around sneakers again reminded him of his passion for sneakers growing up. Not long after, Allison began to buy sneakers for herself as well. She always dreamt of owning shoes like the Air Yeezy, and Black Cement 3s. But growing up in a family of 6, owning sneakers like those was not attainable. Once we were both able to start reselling, we made it into an actual Instagram page, and slowly started building our clientele base. Soon after, Corey quit his job to grow the business full-time. The first year was definitely not easy. We reached a point where we almost had to return to our old jobs and let go of selling shoes for good. Despite all our difficulties, we have sprung back on our feet and have taken our business to places we did not imagine when we sold our first pair of shoes. We base our brand behind more than just selling shoes. We try to focus on the community aspect behind sneakers, and in the process show our customers that we appreciate where they have gotten us today. Every share, every purchase, and every follow has made a tremendous difference in our growth, and for that, we are forever grateful.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey has been a fairly smooth road?
One of the biggest obstacles in reselling is avoiding getting scammed. We have gotten scammed with fake shoes, customers claiming they did not receive their shoe, and even being handed fake bills during a transaction. Just like in any other business, there are times when you take a loss and there is nothing you can do about it but learn. Other challenges we’ve faced is managing our inventory and being able to keep up with the pace of such fast growth. It definitely gets overwhelming when you have thousands of orders to fulfill between two people. When you start your own business, you don’t think about what it takes to keep the business running overall. Every day is solely an outcome of your own effort. All in all, we are blessed to be able to face these challenges, and we are constantly learning and growing daily to perfect our craft. As we’ve expanded, we’ve learned how to operate our business in a way that’s more efficient and beneficial.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
As we first began reselling, our focus was more towards building the page and our brand by doing solid business and being generous on pricing. We invested a lot into professional camera equipment and would spend a lot of time taking product pictures for our Instagram. Our customers were really into the pictures, and at the time, that was enough to set us apart from the average small business. As we began to grow, we had to adapt and find other ways to connect with people, rather than just selling them shoes. We began to emphasize the point of creating reels and short videos and choosing to center our content around being “relatable”. We’ve spent a bit of time recently studying trends and applying the concept of sneakers into our videos. Our following has grown a lot since then, and one of our videos has even gotten millions of view on Instagram! We would say that being able to bring relatable, funny, content on top of our customer service really sets us apart from others. We are most proud of being able to entertain people of all ages and using this as a way to build trust when it comes to shopping with us.
Can you talk to us a bit about happiness and what makes you happy?
Allison- What makes me happy is having been able to find a balance in my life recently. After I quit my job to run the business with my boyfriend full-time, I had to go straight to work on making the most out of my time. For a while, we were working 70-hour weeks. We became so exhausted that the business felt stagnant. Recently, we have been more firm on enforcing our policies, and really considering how much more we could be accomplishing by just taking time to actually be ourselves a few times a week. I have purposely made more time for my friends and family recently, and more time for my health as well.
Corey- My happiness has come from building my relationship with myself. I have been able to take personal time away from the business to go to the gym, play basketball, and work on my mental health. I am also spending more time with my family, and that helps a lot. Within the business, we have been given numerous opportunities recently which have really helped us take our brand to the next level. This past weekend, we were part of a pop-up shop at Urban Outfitters! It was great exposure and a fun time. I remember back when I wasn’t able to afford sneakers, but now to have the business come this far is truly a blessing.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/caflipz/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/people/Ca-Flipz/100027163071439/
- Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@caflipz
