Q&A: Vintage Hawks, the gear-flipping gurus of Lawrence, KS
Streakers, meet Sae-Vheon and Tae-Vheon Alcorn. Not only are these Jayhawk twins running a bustling vintage business, The Vintage Hawks, but they are rising juniors on KU’s track team. (Related: The Jayhawks have an Olympian!) Despite the fact that they are currently college students, the Alcorns are experienced entrepreneurs: The Vintage Hawks isn’t even their first drop-shipping business, as they had one in high school in Gardner, KS.
What I love about Vintage Hawks is how necessary it feels as an archive, especially to someone who is always scouring the net for forgotten Jayhawk gear. I’m always floored by how much great retro apparel I see on campus when I’m back in Lawrence—I see you Depop—and it’s safe to say that the Alcorn’s vintage hauls represent the cream of the crop, and at awesome price points, too.
Sae and Tae have that innate Gen Z feel for social platforms, and they’re warm, thoughtful young men with their eyes on a bright future. (Their older brother, Stephonn, is a former KU student body president and currently works as a Racial Justice & Equity Policy Analyst for The White House). But for all the talk about entrepreneurship and post-grad careers, their passion for KU is the engine of Vintage Hawks.
Last week, I called Sae and Tae to get the inside story of why they do what they do. Check out Vintage Hawks online and on IG. I’ve donated this week’s subscription income to Sae and Tae’s charity of choice, Kansas City G.I.F.T., an organization that is awarding grants to Black-owned business in KC.
So, this isn’t your first go-around with selling gear. What was your first business like?
TAE-VHEON ALCORN: We just know how to sell things online. And the number one thing we sold was apparel. We'd sell hoodies, t-shirts, tank tops… you name it, we probably sold it. Well, we actually sold around 10,000 units in high school using e-commerce drop shipping.
So, a little more context—I had an account with a million followers on Vine and Sae-Vheon had an account with a million followers as well. And before Vine died, Sae-Vheon leveraged all of his followers and got them to go follow his Instagram account. So Sae was running a fan page with about a million followers, a little bit less than a million followers, and we were just selling clothing and apparel online.
So we actually just got more experienced over the years and just figured out how to sell clothes online. When we came to KU as freshman in the fall of 2019, we had taken a break from running our high school business, but we really just missed some clothes online. We saw people on campus wearing great vintage stuff and we said, “Hey, let’s start this back up again and start selling stuff again.”
SAE-VHEON ALCORN: When COVID hit in 2020, we took that time to figure out how to create this business, and figure out how to sell to KU students and KU alumni at a really high scale. Above all, we just have a passion for this, and a passion and love for vintage apparel.
I don’t expect you to give away all your trade secrets. But where do you guys thrift and find the pieces for Vintage Hawks?
TAE-VHEON: I’ll be transparent!
Anywhere, honestly. So whether it's the Goodwill, Savers, Salvation Army, any local thrift store, you go there and you're bound to find something that you like. Our family lives in a small town called Gardner, which is probably about 30 minutes from Kansas City. So we'd drive from Gardner and hit every thrift store between here and there. We definitely found a lot of great stuff that way.
SAE-VHEON: Hit up anywhere and everywhere. My advice would be to always go into the place that you're looking through with an open mind. Jayhawks fans might not love hearing this, but one of my coolest things ever found was actually a K-State shirt that was signed by Bill Snyder. That was at Goodwill for 90 cents, maybe less than that.
Do you guys have Jayhawk grails you’re chasing, or that you’ve acquired for the store?
TAE-VHEON: We sold one of our greatest finds ever earlier this year. It was a sweatshirt with Jayhawk dunking, an incredible graphic piece. It wrapped around the front and the back, so the front part of the graphic actually matched the backside.
It was too big for us. But if I hunt and find it again in a smaller size, I'm going to keep it forever.
We also have a jersey (front of jersey pictured up top) —Sae and I share it—it’s Nike and its reversible. It’s awesome. Walking around Lawrence and going to the basketball games, I’ve never seen another one. So that’s my favorite piece right now. We also have a bunch of rare Starter jackets. But yeah, I’m definitely looking for that sweatshirt again.
So, you guys have been in school right in the heart of the adidas era. Which era of KU sports gear is your favorite?
SAE-VHEON: This is a great question. I think that those early 2000s Nike years were by far the best years ever. Anytime I go back and look at it, I think, “This is the best-looking stuff KU ever had.” Whenever we have Nike gear that’s KU related, it draws a lot of attention. Anything Nike-related, we love it.
TAE-VHEON: My personal favorite period for KU gear would be 1988-1998, that decade. KU won the championship in ‘88, so immediately they released a lot of cool exclusive tees. Throughout the years, anytime we saw one, we grabbed it. I haven’t actually sold a shirt from ‘88 yet—I have 25 or 30 shirts from that championship game. They’re so awesome, and they’re really exclusive. I also have two shirts signed by Danny Manning from that championship season, and those are just awesome to have.
In 1998, that year marked the 100 year anniversary of KU basketball. So that year, KU released exclusive KU gear. (Editors note: If anyone has an embroidered Lee Jeans denim shirt from this exact “100 years” period, please reach out). When we come across stuff from that decade, it’s an immediate buy.
KU has so many cool +old graphics, types and prints, and currently we’re using so little of it. If you were given the keys to a KU sports redesign, what would you do?
TAE-VHEON: I would start with the fans first. The fans should have the biggest say in anything. Sae and I do polls in our Instagram stories and we always ask, “Nike or adidas?” People prefer Nike to adidas. Other Big 12 and SEC schools have Nike and they have amazing gear, and all of it looks better than KU’s, respectfully. But I would talk to the fans and see what the fans want, personally.
In terms of designing, there’s Nike, but Nike also has Jordan as well. Sae, correct me if I’m wrong, but UCLA is Jordan brand now….
SAE-VHEON: Tae, you’re saying everything perfectly. Nike and Jordan are living under one umbrella, and the Nike schools have the opportunity to become Jordan schools. If we ever had that opportunity, to be able to collaborate with Jordan as well, that would be amazing.
Hit the Vintage Hawks here and follow them on IG to participate in some of their limited drops and auctions.