Toki’s founders left their jobs at GCash to start the safest, most trustworthy online marketplace for collectibles in the Philippines.
THE THRILL of finding and obtaining rare, coveted shoes is what bonds the sneakerhead community. Sleek running shoes, chunky and colorful Japanese-style shoes, and classic Air Force Ones worn by many a basketball player are just a few of the many types of sneakers a collector might want.
Frederic Levy, Zoe Ocampo, and Jules Jurado, co-founders of Toki, the largest online sneaker marketplace in the Philippines, found that the average collector doesn’t only collect one kind of thing. In the country, epic constructions like Star Wars spacecraft and sports cars, all made of LEGO blocks, are the second biggest collectible category after sneakers. This is followed by the vast array of cute action figures depicting pop culture characters known as Funko Pops.
The fourth is trading cards, particularly NBA cards, reflecting “a very Filipino-specific situation,” according to Mr. Levy, who is also Toki’s chief executive officer. The Philippines is known to be the most basketball-crazy country in Southeast Asia.
Toki, a new e-commerce platform that started in 2023, has thus far focused on these four categories. The three founders recently toured the media around their headquarters in mySTAY BGC East, Bonifacio Global City, Taguig.
The start-up received around P105 million in seed funding from venture capital firms Kaya Founders and Foxmont Capital Partners. Notable investors from the tech space are Anthony Oundjian from the Boston Consulting Group, Brian Cu from SariSuki, Ernest Cu from Globe Telecom, and Bigboy Cheng of Uratex who is a renowned sneaker collector.
With more than 100,000 users, around 200 sellers, and at least 500 livestream auctions so far — revolving around over 100,000 different products (about 35,000 of which are sneakers) — Toki aims to “bring a more seamless experience to the collectors’ journey, from discovery to purchase.”
Chief executive officer Mr. Levy described to BusinessWorld what a collector had to go through before Toki. “You have to find your item and your seller on Facebook, negotiate with him on Viber, pay through GCash, handle your delivery or your logistics through Lalamove or Grab. And at the end of all of that, accidents can happen, including fake items.
“Every collector is scammed regularly, even seasoned collectors. It always happens,” he said.
And that’s why he, Ms. Ocampo, and Mr. Jurado decided to leave their jobs at GCash to start the safest, most trustworthy online marketplace for collectibles in the Philippines.
CURATED SELLERS
Toki’s main value proposition is its strict verification process that ensures every seller on the platform is authorized to sell collectibles. Unlike other online marketplaces of the world that are basically open to anyone, Toki has a scoring system for verifying sellers.
According to Ms. Ocampo, the chief product officer, this entails ocular visits to view the seller’s stocks before onboarding them, as well as checking the items before sending them out for delivery.
“We want to make sure that when collectors buy an item from Toki, they will have zero doubt that this item is authentic,” she told the press during the tour.
While the Filipino market for collectibles is a large one — comprising 37% of the population — Toki prides itself in building around the warm, tightknit community that surrounds collecting toys and sneakers.
It’s a platform that encourages livestream auctions, said chief strategy and data officer Mr. Jurado. “The sellers build a connection with the collectors, and it becomes a more enjoyable experience,” he said.
GOING PHYSICAL
What’s next for Toki is a physical extension of these offerings, something the platform already started working on by joining Toycon 2024 in June.
“An online-to-offline experience would provide services like authentication or grading of an item,” said Mr. Levy. “We also envision this kind of physical extension as a destination venue, kind of like a concept store. When you arrive, you can buy some collectibles, maybe see some art pieces, or enjoy the community and trade with them.”
In the meantime, the three founders teased that the next product they’re planning to launch this year is fashion. This means designer clothes, streetwear brands, and vintage pieces.
“We see that there is a lot of overlap of this category with others. We have a lot more in store for Filipino collectors,” he added. — Brontë H. Lacsamana