Allike Store first established in 2009. At first dedicated exclusively to the online business arena, the store based in Hamburg, Germany, decided to open its own brick and mortar store this year.
Following a consistent start of operations, Allike is currently becoming a top reference for all things sneakers and streetwear.
We had the opportunity to interview Fiete Bluhm about the past and present of Allike, and much more.
Read the insightful interview on the latest edition of our Stories of Stores feature.
What is the story behind the establishment of Allike?
Allike established in 2009 basically as a home based business with some sneakers and went from 2009 till now quite with some ups and downs…
Tell us about the initial motivation that led you to found the store…
Selling shoes to buy some more shoes.
What can you tell us about the whole business so far?
The sneaker business is totally crazy right now, everybody wants to get a piece of the cake and it starts to get shady…
We do know that you guys recently opened a brick and mortar store – how about that experience so far?
It has been great so far, we are also very excited to have those great clothing and accessory brands in our store who contemplate so good to the sneakers we have. The brands we carry are clothing wise norse projects, wood wood, Libertine-Libertine, and many more.
You also recently updated your website – are there any new features that you might want to share about?
We thought with the all black look, we are done with that. I really liked in 2009 when I started the idea of an all black store, as it goes really well with the meaning of allike, which is actually a black bird, but after all these years it was time for a change. So now we are all white, basically the whole user experience was updated and navigation was made easier. Now gimmicks was our goal, just to offer a clean and easy to understand shopping experience.
What is your opinion regarding the sneaker industry these days? Is there just too much hype around it?
I think release wise, it is way too much. Every weekend there is one release from some brands, you almost start to oversee the good ones. But these are our times and I think it can’t be like 5 years ago where there were just some major releases everybody talked about. What really is different is the amount of stores popping up and the amount of people who want the best accounts after being in business for one year or so.
Allike currently has a considerable number of sneaker and street wear brands – any other fine labels to be made available soon?
We are very proud to work together with French brand surface 2 air and Kazuki Kayashis brand “the fourness” starting spring 2015. But maybe we have some other things going on for spring 2015, who knows… but these are the two brands I can officially talk about.
What about the whole online experience? What do you think is the most important thing when you’re selling products online?
I think nowadays it is the best to keep it simple, great product pics, a small description is always important to me personally and the main facts regarding the product, so, keep it simple, but not to simple…
Just how do you see the future for the whole sneaker industry, regarding both product and customer experience?
There are going to be some major changes regarding the retail structure in Europe in 2015, some major players are going to enter the market and the smaller shops will have a hard time to keep up in the game. Also I have the impression that the major sneaker brands are trying to start b2c business directly with the customer leaving the classic sneaker shop out, so we will see…
Discover more about Allike Store.