Inside Corteiz's 99p Store
The London-based streetwear label has the city on lock—again.
The Pound is crashing. Inflation is reaching record highs. And to top it all off, the long-standing 99p McDonald's cheeseburger is no more. The perfect storm for the Corteiz (also known as CRTZ) 99p Store.
"Who even carries change anymore?" Someone snapped. Well, 3000 people waiting on Shepherd's Bush Green, hoping to get their hands on the coveted cargo pants for 99p, made sure to—including me.
Established in 2017, Corteiz is a London-based streetwear brand founded by the mononymous Clint419. For a relatively young brand, in age and audience, it's acquired a cult following, not through ordinary advertising campaigns, but through unconventional stunts and spectacles.
In a landscape where hype is currency, Corteiz's many guerilla marketing strategies have propelled the brand to the forefront of youth culture and fashion circles alike.
The label's combative style is its signature, with the instantly recognisable Alcatraz logo stamped on its pieces representing "rebellion against convention, [which is] considered the core message behind the brand," according to Vogue.
It's also a brand that puts the street in streetwear, as I witnessed hundreds running in hordes over the weekend for the latest drop. Although it has been famously donned by Skepta, Jorja Smith, and more, the demand generated by the community—and as Clint reiterates, not by celebrities—has never been greater.
By not counting on clout, but forging it from bedroom aspirations, Corteiz has oddly cultivated a kind of rarity. The kind that will have supporters sprinting around London for a piece.
In fact, on Saturday, a reported 3000 people showed up in West London, after following clues and coordinates shared on social media to attend Corteiz's 99p Store, where the label was selling their triple black cargo pants for the low, low price of 99p. Advertised by a retro first-person body-rig visual posted on socials just a day prior to the drop, it featured a customer wandering Shepherd's Bush Market and stumbling upon the find in a market stall.
Corteiz advertisement over the years. Images property of Corteiz.
Followers were then instructed to bring exact change, which was heard and seen in the counting of coppers in frenzied hands. Then, cryptic coordinates followed the day of, and London showed out within seconds.
As I was running my errands nearby, fate found me there early. Early enough to see orderly queues separated by letter sizes, enforced by men in black, soon devolve into a chaotic crowd.
This streetwear scavenger hunt was met with confusion by onlookers. "All this for shorts?!" an OAP asked. "It's like Moses and the Red Sea," another joked as Clint bobbed through a breach in between the growing mass. Tickets were then passed out, few and far between, and as Castillo would say: it's not looking good, bruv.
If you were the lucky few who received a ticket, that granted you access to an actual 99p store, haphazardly hired out by CRTZ, evidenced by an iPhone Notes app screenshot from Clint: 'PAY BOSSMAN A RACK TO KEEP HIS MOUTH SHUT N NOT COMPLAIN BOUT NOTHIN.' One in, one out. Hand over your coins, and receive your prize.
For one, Clint has engineered overall access to be exclusive and limited. Even online. You cannot purchase the latest drop without a password to enter the website, which is shared on Twitter and sometimes, even decided by fans. Drops are also organised for supporters to cop a piece at significant discounts, even for free, in-person—all incentivising active engagement with the label's social media.
Once items sell out, they might not return so "customers are left with one-time drops and because of the value that Clint has created for himself and his clothes," a Corteiz fan told me, "the garms can be worth a lot of money."
However, reselling is actively discouraged, as Clint has been shown to target sellers on Depop, cancel their orders, or buy the items himself to ensure he is the sole trader for his pieces—i.e. look no further than the Don't Be a Harry short film. Though difficult to completely control, it shows an active involvement to stem the over-circulation of the brand and retain rarity.
Don't Be a Harry short film directed by Walid Labri, produced by Ground Works and starring Ari. Property of Corteiz and Luke C. Harper.
Chances are you've primarily heard of the brand through its various innovative stunts and marketing packages. From random T-shirt drops in the streets to Da Great Bolo Exchange, they've become a hood household name. Here's an abridged timeline:
The National Sock Lotto - June 2022
Instructions: Buy 2 or more pairs of socks to be in with the chance of receiving a prize of £5000 stuffed in a pair.
CRTZRTW NATIONAL SOCK LOTTO®
— CRTZRTW (@crtzrtw) June 16, 2022
FRIDAY 7PM LUNDUN TIME.
A RANDOM PERSON WHO BUYS
2+ MORE PAIRS OF SOCKS WILL RECEIVE A [£5000] IN A PAIR OF THEIR SOCKS
**GUESS THE EXACT AMOUNT IN THE DUFFEL BAG AND WE’LL GIVE YOU £200 TO RUN UP ON THE STORE TOMORROW* 💸😤
C U DER. 7PM FRIDAY. pic.twitter.com/W2B3N0YI3H
Da Great Bolo Exchange - January 2022
Instructions: Go to the disclosed location wearing a puffer jacket from either North Face, Stüssy, Supreme, Stone Island, Moncler, Canada Goose, or Arc’teryx in order to be eligible to have it swapped off your back for one of 50 unreleased Bolo jackets.
DA GREAT BOLO EXCHANGE.
— CRTZRTW (@crtzrtw) January 21, 2022
SATURDAY 3PM IN LUNDUN🇬🇧
- SWAP YOUR N🤡RTH F😢CE
N🤪PSTE 🔂
FOR AN UNRELEASED CRTZ BOLO JACKET.
- FREE OF CHARGE.
LIMITED TO 5️⃣0️⃣ BOLO’S.
- FIRST COME. FIRST SERVE.
DON’T CRY. DON’T BEG.
- 📍🗺 COORDINATES DROP TOMOZ.
RULESTHEWORLD. https://t.co/escRPXaBdH
No Travelcard No Tee - September 2021
Instructions: Be in Zone 1, London, at 3pm. Bring a TFL travelcard as your ticket to a free Corteiz T-shirt.
The Instagram Live Giveaway - April 2021
Instructions: Spam the comment section of the IG Live to win socks, tracksuit bottoms, or graphic tees. Just don't hurt your thumbs in the process.
Arguably their most iconic effort was da Great Bolo Exchange. To advertise the new Bolo puffer jacket, CRTZ posted a location on socials along with instructions to trade in designer jackets from prestige brands for one of 50 unreleased Bolo jackets, free of charge.
It's no coincidence that the labels Corteiz deemed eligible for a swap were the ones dictating London streetwear. Footage from the exchange hit the feeds, and the response was split. Some ridiculed swappers for downgrading their drip while others remarked on the ingenuity of the strategy.
In one fell swoop, Corteiz wiped a few competitors' jackets from the market while continuing to build hype for the brand. It was later learned that the jackets swapped were donated to a homeless shelter.
But how does Corteiz have so much cultural cache in just a few years of its inception? Beyond the engineered scarcity, is the cultivation of a community. The brand clearly benefits from its conceptual campaigns but also the support of an online community, without which, you could argue, the designs wouldn't take off.
Of course, the brand's persona as a vehicle for its success also cannot be ignored, characterised by Clint's unwavering, and often hilariously hostile, dedication to his craft. Known to openly shame copycats, Clint sold parody T-shirts in response to Boohoo's release of an imitation Corteiz logo tracksuit.
Also, this week, Manière De Voir has come under fire for committing the same offence and Clint has butted heads with owner Reece Wabara as a result. The hands-on insistence on preserving the work and building a "culture" is an effort to rid any notion of selling out—reminiscent of the CRTZ ethos—as Clint has accused Wabara of doing: "Man can have all the rolls royces, rolexs, forbes articles & rich lists but you will never have culture, and that's priceless."
Clint started his first label, CADE, alongside his friend Ade Sanusi in 2015. Garnering attention in fringe streetwear circles, this became a crash course in fashion marketing and set the tone for Corteiz's future mass success.
CADE's tagline 'On the Map' is starkly similar to Corteiz's 'Rules the World' and that mentality has carried through as the brand has taken its drops as far as the 3rd arrondissement in Paris to 'DOWN UNDA' in Melbourne. The brand had even caught the attention of the late, great Virgil Abloh, who took Clint under his wing months before his untimely passing.
More than anything, Corteiz has made waves for being responsible for the kind of marketing strategy ad execs in high-rise boardrooms couldn't mastermind and enforce. Its non-conformist approach to fashion marketing makes it one of the most sought-after streetwear staples, digitally and physically.
From Paris to Melbourne, and Lagos to 'LUNDUN'—as I’ve witnessed—CRTZ really does RTW.