MEMPHIS, Tenn. — A Nike vice president is off the job, after a news report reveals her son used a credit card attached to her name for his resale sneaker business.
According to a CBS News report, Ann Hebert’s son spent $132,000 worth of Yeezy’s on a credit card, and sold them for a $20,000 profit.
The corporate giant, which has a large setup here in Memphis, told Bloomberg she had disclosed needed information, and they found no conflicts of interest.
Flashy sneakers are a hot commodity leading to people waiting in line for hours, spending hundreds on Yeezys or other brands. But they’ve also become hot for resellers, which is someone swooping them up when they’re released to the public.
Then the shoes are resold to the public, and the seller making a pretty profit. The market is so rich for the most popular sneakers there are even expos here in Memphis.
Now, the story making headlines is about 19-year-old Joe Hebert out of Oregon. His story was told in Bloomberg Businessweek. As Bloomberg reports, the teen who goes by “West Coast Joe” to his followers explained to a reporter how he turns a profit.
In one instance he gathered a group of people and then used bots to get past a system designed to only let one person at a time purchase the shoes. He used a credit card to buy more then $130,000 in Yeezys and then resold them cashing in with a $20,000 profit.
But when the teen sent statements to the Bloomberg reporter to show just how much money he was making, the reporter researched the name on the American Express credit card, tracing it back to Ann Hebert, Nike’s Vice President and General Manager for North America.
Additional researched showed she had been recently promoted to the job. Nike called said the move “instrumental in accelerating Consumer Direct Offense.”
Joe Hebert also told Bloomberg he never received inside information from his mother or discount codes.