The last time we actually talked about this topic was back in 2015, when the term “Unauthorised Authentic” was hotly used by almost every Malaysian fake shoe seller on the internet trying to paddle off their fake goods to some newbie in the sneaker scene, and mind you, back in 2015, sneakers were just starting to blow up in Malaysia. With the resurgence of hype for Jordans, and the Adidas Boost starting to get more traction not just within the sneaker community, but beyond that, the scene started to see an influx of interest. It was a time where the sneaker scene was truly growing. Hence, with this emergence, there is bound to be a lot of newcomers who do not really have the knowledge in all things sneakers, what more something like a term such as, “Unauthorised Authentic” (UA), which is the focal point of our discussion.
Back in 2015, it was very common to hear cases of people saying they got conned into buying a pair of fake shoes, and most of the time the way the fake sellers pitched to them is always the same, “Ini kasut Unauthorised Authentic bro“.
For those of you who are new to the sneaker scene, and you do not really know what the term means, or maybe you’ve read about it before but kinda forgot what it really is, head to this link here for a quick recap before continuing.
So fast forward 4 years later to 2019, and we still see fake shoe sellers trying to paddle fake shoes to newbies using the same term. Nothing much has changed, except for one thing, the fake shoe sellers (specifically University of Kicks) are using OUR ARTICLE TO HELP THEM SELL! Yes, you heard it right. The same one we wrote back in 2015, they have delightfully cherrypicked the few paragraphs and quoted it to support the whole ‘Unauthorised Authentic’ drama. Hence forth, I’m writing this updated article to clarify, and hopefully educate the community a little bit.
If you’ve read the article we previously wrote, the whole concept of UA is that a single factory would produce a few thousand pairs of shoe (depends on the order) and the factory is in charge of the entire process, A-Z of producing the shoe. For example if Nike were to place an order of 10,000 pairs, majority of the time the factory would overproduce and come out with something like 15,000 pairs. The extra numbers are there because some pairs may not make it pass the Quality Control process. Once Nike has QC’ed and approved 10,000 pairs, the factories are then required to burn the rest. Of course, in this capitalist environment, the factory would sometimes decide to sell it out to the secondary market instead.
From a retail price of approximately RM 3200, UOK sells one for RM299.
Essentially then, the truth about “Unauthorised Authentic” all boils down to this:
“THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS UNAUTHORISED AUTHENTIC!”
If we were back in 2015, yes it would still exist. But as of now, there is no such thing, and anyone who says otherwise and is trying to sell you shoes saying it is a legit base on that reason, high possibility that he/she is selling you a fake pair.
Why does the term no longer exist? Here are some of the reasons why:
- Previously major shoe companies do not own their own production factories, and outsource the production to third party factories around the world to produce the shoes. That was the case then. Now, almost all the major shoe brands have their own manufacturing plants, and production is entirely in their control. This helps reduce the number of wastage in terms of materials or number of pairs produce. This would mean that the number of UA pairs would be almost none.
- Another thing to take note is that previously the factories producing the shoes are not owned by the brands themselves, hence they have no qualms selling off the leftover pairs. But now, the factories are own by the brand themselves, which means if they do have any leftover pairs, and they do sell it off to the open market. It would only hurt the brand in the long run because UA pairs are usually sold cheaper in comparison to the official retail price.
- Shoe companies still produce with outsourced manufacturers, but only for special cases (example Adidas 4D or BOOST) where by they need a specialist to do it. And all this manufacturers have signed NDAs (Non-Disclosure Agreement) and if the agreement is broken, it would cost the specialist company a lot of legal damage. In the hundreds of millions in damages. There are a lot of fake BOOST pairs floating around the market now, but one thing to note is that BASF is the only official maker of BOOST, and Adidas will purchase the BOOST soles from them to be assembled into Ultraboost or other BOOST products in their own factories.
- This is a fact that is specific to the Vapormax silhouette. The only place that the Vapormax soles are produced from is in Beaverton, Oregon or St. Louis, Missouri. Both this factories are known as the Air Manufacturing Innovation Plants. The air units are then sent to their own factories around the world to be assembled into a pair of Vapormax.
- Majority of the shoe companies produce various parts of the shoes in various different factories. The parts are then sent to one factory to be assembled. This style of doing it is called “specialisation”. Which means each factory specialises in making only that one part of that shoe. This helps increase efficiency and reduces wastage.
- There are factories that do produce shoes using the A-Z style, which means everything about the shoe is produced within that factory, but most of this factories are owedn by the brand themselves.
*Do note that all this facts were sourced from various credible sources who are in charge of manufacturing for some of these brands, be it in the company or outsourced specialist.*
To wrap up this updated version of what is the true meaning of “Unauthorised Authentic”, it is safe to say that it no longer exists. What makes matters worst is that the fake pairs that are coming out these days have almost little to no difference with the original ones. So unless your source is a fully trusted one, do make your purchase from the brand stores itself, or from a legit sneaker store.
If you want to buy something from an online seller, and don’t know what are the kinda things you should be looking out for, head on over to our article HERE on how to avoid being scammed.
