After some time, coming with another review. This time, a pair of V2 Zebras from Sam, according to him this are his own batch from his own factory. These were sent for free for an unbiased and honest review.

Feel free to help spotting mistakes/flaws that I might have missed as this time I don’t have retails to compare unlike other V2s. At the same time, have in mind stuff that varies between sizes or even each pair. Not all retails look the same.

SELLER, SHIPPING AND PACKAGING

Sam communicated quite fast through Whatsapp (all his information will be at the end of the review), always answering within a few hours depending on how busy he was.

He shipped through EMS on the 19th and arrived on the 26th. No issues with customs or anything. Was delivered to my house through Correos which is the local/national shipping company for Spain, so depends on where you live, will be different. EMS is definitely safer regarding customs compared to DHL, although a bit slower most of the time.

Regarding packaging, it came double boxed, and this is the box that has arrived from China in the best condition. Almost flawless. Hell, it’s even in better condition than some of my retail boxes. Not a big deal for most people, but nice to see. Depending on the shipping company they might end up better or worse though.

The shoes came in independent plastic bags inside the box just so they arrived in good condition. There were included a business card with his information and a keychain just to match the shoes. Nothing uncommon, but always nice to receive a little gift!

THE SHOES VS RETAIL

As I said, I don’t have retails in hand to compare unlike on the Breds review, but will try my best to compare both.

The box label looks nice. No apparent big flaws. Just so you don’t get called out when your friends check your collection at your house or you don’t have to hide the box or something. This is the US retail label by the way. Not the international/european one.

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Here you can have an overall view of them. They look good for the most part. But as soon as I took them out of the box something was wrong. Everything behind the toebox is higher than it should be. I compared the height of the ankle collar on this pair and a retail bred. It’s 0.5-1 cm too high on this pair of zebras. It’s weird though because on feet, it’s not noticeable and they look almost perfect, and on some pictures you can easily tell, in others you can’t.

Compared to the StockX pictures (angle can make a difference here but you can see what I mean), the lower part of the shoe, just above the midsole, it’s a bit too high. This might just be my pair as other pictures on his site look fine or at least better than mine.

The midsole and sole color are pretty accurate compared to others, although even the restock pairs, European and US pairs usually differ a bit in some characteristics as they used different factories.

At first I thought this would be an issue, but on feet (video and pics further down in the review) they look just fine. I also wore this pair a few times and got NOTHING BUT COMPLIMENTS (and this was with people who are sneakerheads and got retail V2s and other stuff too).

Let’s keep going. Checking the text on the side, it looks okay. Not too far from the pulltab, it’s slightly thinner and slightly taller than retail (I personally like it this way more than on retails but regarding accuracy, not 1:1, but not noticeable unless you have retails side by side) follows the white stripe properly…Nothing wrong.

The pulltab and the heel look fine too. Nothing caught my attention.

One thing that I don’t see mentioned a lot, is the primeknit. This one feels basically like retail, it’s pretty soft and comfy. Why do I mention this? Because I had PK Creams (one of the first batches, don’t know if this has changed) and the primeknit was stiff as fuck and wasn’t near as comfortable after a long time as retails or other reps, and honestly at first I cared mostly about how 1:1 the shoe was, but now, I rather have a minor flaw that’s not noticeable on foot than having an uncomfortable shoe. For example, the primeknit on the SS is lightly softer than retails and is comfortable af and I love wearing them even if they aren’t as 1:1 as other top tier batches. Same goes for these zebras.

Boost looks good. This part is inconsistent as fuck with every new V2 release (my retail Creams, which I sold long time ago, had the boost looking like melted marshmallow) so it isn’t a great way to LC or compare. It’s pretty soft, more or less like retail and feels basically the same on foot. I’d say that it’s more defined than retails for the most part though.

The black stuff on the ankle collar seems to be the black primeknit showing through the collar material, thought it was a stain but seems like I was wrong taking a closer look. Besides that, this part looks alright too, not 1:1 in shape and materials as retails, but that’s common on reps on this part.

The underside of the insole looks really damn close to retail compared to other reps, specially the text on the side. The adidas YEEZY print isn’t good though, pretty blurry. Not a big deal if you’re gonna wear these honestly, just don’t be a d*ck and try to scam people.

The size tag inside the shoe is fine, the UPC code matches with the box, the font isn’t 1:1 but it’s pretty darn close anyway. Has the production date of the Restock Zebras, not the first release. Sam told me they used a retail pair as reference to produce these, and the restock is known to have worse QC and more inconsistency between pairs so that might have something to do with some “supposed flaws” of this pair.

ON FEET

Click on the images to zoom in.

I’d say they looks pretty nice on feet. If you look straight from the floor, it still looks slightly taller than it should be. But if you have someone looking like that to check your shoes you should just smack them or something. As I said I worse this a few times and didn’t have any issue. They’re really nice and wore them for hours and hours without issue.

ON FEET VIDEO

Honestly they look even better on this video than on the pictures. Hopefully you enjoy it!

Video recorded with a Samsung S8, 1080p 60fps.

Conclusion

At first when I got them I thought the height-thing would be an issue. After wearing them and taking some pictures and video, I don’t care at all. They’re awesome. Yes, they can still be improved, but that is what this review is for. No glaring flaws where there usually are, like on the text, stripe height, etc. You won’t be disappointed if you get these, although all I can say is that I can recommend Sam as a seller, no matter which batch you want. He has a huge amount of models on his site, his service is quite nice and you have a trustworthy seller that might not be as busy as others so you can get your stuff quick and easy, at least in my experience.

W2C

He has a lot of shoes while he updates to the most recent batch as soon as possible, at least for the most part. 10% Discount: skru10

Sam’s website: http://www.sneakerkicks.ru/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sneakerkicksru/

Whatsapp: +8618559392863

Email: sneakerkicks@outlook.com