Grateful Dead x Nike SB Dunk Launch Had Thousands Waiting

There’s a ton of excitement around Nike SB’s new collaboration with the Grateful Dead. A follow-up of sorts to the Ben & Jerry’s “Chunky Dunky,” this is the next pop culture-driven sneaker in the Nike SB line that transcends the usual consumer and reaches a whole new community. This time, it could be one of the brand’s most unexpected pairings yet, and that’s saying a lot. Following a San Francisco-exclusive launch of the orange colorway ahead of a wider launch this week for the green and yellow iterations, the Grateful Dead used its own website to give fans a second shot at the orange pair and a first chance at the remaining two colors.

You can probably already guess how this went down. After opening up a microsite on its dead.net homepage around noon ET, the website was flooded with throngs of footwear collectors and Dead devotees alike—something not unlike a digital SNKRS Stash on Shakedown Street. Wait times varied, and while an exact number of participants was not announced, Complex staff were among the hundreds of thousands of users waiting in line as seen in the screenshot below.

When the gates finally opened, patient users were led to a form that allowed them to sign up for a chance to purchase the Grateful Dead x Nike SB Dunk Low sneakers. The good news is, the sweepstakes is still open until tomorrow at noon, and the queue has now calmed down considerably, allowing users to bypass the wait and get their entry in.