Soletron was a social networking and ecommerce platform in lifestyle retail verticals. It is headquartered in

Fort Lauderdale, Florida Fort Lauderdale ( ) is a coastal city located in the U.S. state of Florida, north of Miami along the Atlantic Ocean. It is the county seat of and most populous city in Broward County, Florida, Broward County with a population of 182,760 at the ...

and holds offices in

Philadelphia Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

, and

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. Their revenue model is similar to

Etsy Etsy, Inc. is an American e-commerce company with an emphasis on the selling of handmade or vintage items and craft supplies. These items fall under a wide range of categories, including jewelry, bags, clothing, home decor, religious items, furni ...

Formation

Soletron was founded in September 2010 by former Merrill Lynch bankers A.J. Steigman and Shane Robinson with the goal of becoming a social networking and ecommerce company. In March 2011 they launched their blog and their app debuted in October 2011. Their ecommerce platform was established in December 2011. Soletron Founders

General information

The Soletron platform is designed to facilitate the interaction between consumers and independent brands. Soletron has a structure similar to Etsy as it does not hold any inventory. Sellers sign up through the website to post their inventory online. Soletron brings a social element to retail as users can create profiles to follow brands or other members. They can also favorite products and share them with the online community. Soletron features a lifestyle blog meant to keep its visitors up to date on sneakerhead trends. Soletron is known for launching the first ever sneakerhead comic book as part of its marketing efforts and has been deemed a source of authority for the community. They cater mainly to sneakerheads and streetwear consumers, that are between the ages of 15–25. In November 2012, the company transitioned into a full content platform for the youth community. Soletron was acquired in July 2014, by its industry leader and the world's largest global streetwear retailer

Karmaloop Karmaloop is a streetwear e-commerce company. It was founded in 2000 by Greg Selkoe and purchased by Shiekh Shoes in 2016. History Karmaloop was founded in 1999 by Greg Selkoe in his parents' basement in Jamaica Plain, a neighborhood of Boston ...

, for an undisclosed amount.

Statistics

Soletron hosts as many as 300,000 unique monthly visitors and makes 9,000,000 impressions per month. This company has an online presence in over 200 countries. As of February 2013, the company had over 200,000 Twitter followers and 100,000 Facebook fans.

Brands

Nooka and

Dunkelvolk Dunkelvolk is a Peruvian company manufacturing clothes for surfing, skateboarding, BMX and snowboarding. The word ''Dunkelvolk'' is German and means ''Dark Nation'' . The company was created in 1996 by its founders Dieter Zúñiga and Jano Say ...

are two among dozens of brands featured on Soletron's e-commerce platform. Through these brands, they currently have over 1,200 products available on the site.

Advisory board

Soletron's advisory board consists of the following individuals: * Bruce Chizen (Former CEO of

Adobe Systems Adobe Inc. ( ), formerly Adobe Systems Incorporated, is an American software, computer software company based in San Jose, California. It offers a wide range of programs from web design tools, photo manipulation and vector creation, through to ...

) * Santonio Holmes (Super Bowl

MVP MVP most commonly refers to: * Most valuable player, an award, typically for the best performing player in a sport or competition * Minimum viable product, a concept for feature estimating used in business and engineering MVP may also refer to: ...

and current member of the

New York Jets The New York Jets are a professional American football team based in the New York metropolitan area. The Jets compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the American Football Conference (AFC) AFC East, East division. The team p ...

) *Tom Austin (Founder of

AND1 AND1 is an American footwear and clothing company specializing in basketball shoes, clothing, and sporting goods. AND1 was founded on August 13, 1993. The company focuses strictly on basketball and is a subsidiary of Galaxy Universal.

) *John Friedman (Founder of Easton Capital) *Bob Rice (Founder of Tangent Capital and

Bloomberg Bloomberg may refer to: People * Daniel J. Bloomberg (1905–1984), audio engineer * Georgina Bloomberg (born 1983), professional equestrian * Michael Bloomberg (born 1942), American businessman and founder of Bloomberg L.P.; politician a ...

Contributor)

Press and accolades

Soletron has been highlighted in CNBC, Reuters, Huffington Post, Business Insider, and Bloomberg TV.

References

{{Reflist Companies based in Fort Lauderdale, Florida