From teen entrepreneurs to young adults with a downtown storefront

Tyrell Hundley, who was transitioning from eighth grade to high school, really wanted a pair of sneakers at his favorite consignment shop.

But they cost $40. So he took his mother’s lawn mower, tied it to a tree, and placed a “for sale: $55” sign on it, along with his phone number.

Hundley sold it within an hour.

That might seem an unlikely start for Hundley, now 22 and co-owner of Joliet Kreamers in Joliet with longtime friend John Pizano. But it showed his entrepreneurial spirit and knowledge of the sneaker market.

At Joliet Kreamers, located at 173 N. Chicago St. in Joliet, people can buy, trade or sell their sneakers. The storefront opened in August.

But the roots of the business started with Hundley and Pizano creating a Facebook group, where people could sell and trade their sneakers, and the sale of that lawn mower.

Because Hundley then took that $55, bought the sneakers, sold them on the Facebook group for $180, and then bought another pair of sneakers and a new lawn mower for his mother.

“Oh, she was mad,” Hundley said. “But then I said, ‘Mom, I bought you a new lawn mower.’ ”

The transaction also proved to be educational.

“There’s a big market for sneakers,” Hundley said. “A lot of people don’t know that. My mom definitely did not know that.”

Kreamers?

“It means ‘Kicks Rule Everything Around Me,” Hundley said. “We added the ‘er’ because it sounded cooler.”

During their high school years, Hundley and Pizano also created Joliet Kreamers shirts and hoodies, which they sold to their fellow students, who wore them, Hundley said.

“We just thought it was cool,” Hundley said.

But Hundley had also wanted to be a Marine since the time he was 13, so he enlisted after high school. During his service, he continued to educate himself about the sneaker industry. At the end of his four-year service, he reached out to Pizano about opening a storefront.

Their location has 2,000 square feet, but Hundley and Pizano are using only half of it so they can increase the space when needed, Hundley said.

If the Joliet location does well, Hundley would like to franchise in five years, perhaps establishing a store in Arizona, he said.

Hundley said he and Pizano are “all about giving back,” such as buying shoes or uniforms for sports local teams, especially to the Joliet schools and organizations that formed them.

Hundley played baseball in the Belmont Little League. He and Pizano attended Woodland Elementary School and Washington Junior High School. They parted ways in high school, with Hundley graduating from Joliet Central and Pizano from Joliet West, Hundley said.

Hundley is also seeing Joliet Kreamers giving back to the community in a full circle type of way. And that’s in the customer who comes into the store sometimes four times a day.

“He said ‘I don’t have any money to buy new shoes,’” Hundley said. “But when I come in here and see the different shoes, it gives me the motivation to save up and get that pair of shoes.”

For information, visit jolietkreamers.com and Joliet Kreamers on Facebook.