"Have you ever met an athlete in an octagon—in an MMA cage?” asks Jonathan Yuska, the U.S. president of Australian streetwear retailer Culture Kings. “At a competitor’s store, you see two guys—two running backs—sitting at a table signing little headshots. That’s not what we’re doing.”
He’s not just blowing smoke. Last year, Culture Kings really did let folks meet a couple of UFC fighters inside an octagon. Charles Oliveira and Marlon “Chito” Vera rolled up to the Las Vegas flagship to gladhand with fans inside a cage specially constructed for the event. At other shops, logistics would make the stunt impossible. At Culture Kings’ 12,000-square-foot behemoth in the Forum Shops at Ceasars, there was still enough room for the store’s recording studio and built-in bar to remain unaffected (though the cage did have to share space with the half basketball court).
Later on, as Formula 1 mayhem descended on Vegas for the city’s first Grand Prix in November, McLaren driver Lando Norris stopped by—and brought a car with him. Luckily, the racing machine’s comparatively small footprint opened up enough space to allow more fans in for what Culture Kings called its “biggest in store ever.”
Culture KingsLando Norris at Culture Kings Las Vegas.
I could go on, but you get the gist: This isn’t just a store, and these aren’t just clothes. And that’s the whole point. Yuska and the rest of the Culture Kings team both stateside and down under call the concept “retailtainment,” and it’s at the very core of the enterprise. The idea is that simply selling things is no longer enough. Instead, you have to create a “brand story.” This goes double in the fickle, youth-driven world of streetwear, where social media holds enormous sway and competitors with similar offerings are always nipping at your heels.
If you’re a committed fan of personal style, a dedicated follower of fashion, or just an old head who remembers the way that streetwear used to be, all of this might sound a little sad. Cynical, even. But for Yuska and the Culture Kings crew, it simply represents the reality of our current moment.
Culture KingsA 75-foot "hat wall" greets visitors upon entry.
“I think the way content—streetwear content—is consumed is just different now than it used to be,” Yuska says. “If you look at us, we’re an Instagram and TikTok house. Right now, we have explosive growth on TikTok, and that’s because of the content that we’re driving out of Las Vegas. You can tell broader stories now at different levels of culture than in the past.”
“There are still more people opening stores than closing stores in certain sectors of the industry right now,” he continues. “So we’re all experience, all day.”
The market seems to agree, at least in part. Though Culture Kings’ parent company A.K.A. Brands saw global net sales drop 9.6 percent in the third quarter of 2023 (the last period for which data is publicly available), it saw 2 percent growth in the U.S. in the same period. And the Culture Kings Las Vegas store, specifically, surpassed its annual revenue goal.
Culture KingsThe in-house recording studio.
Yuska is coy about where CK might pop up next physically. Instead, he delves into the potential of the brands within the Culture Kings umbrella. Alongside well-known names like New Balance and Asics, the retailer has a stable of in-house lines like MNML, Goat Crew, and Loiter. That stable accounts for 50 percent of the Vegas store’s revenue, according to Yuska. And they seem to be catching on beyond that, too.
Just last month, New York Giants tight end Darren Waller popped up in Esquire’s own Five Fits With series wearing a pair of pants from MNML. Back in the summer, none other than Jay-Z was spotted wearing a tee from Loiter. “When you see Jay-Z wearing Loiter,” Yuska says, “clearly we’re getting the market right.”
Still, there’s a long way to go. “In Australia, there are 26 million people and everyone has heard of Culture Kings,” Yuska says. “In the U.S.? Three hundred million and very, very, very few have heard of it.” So, what’s next? Yuska bets that, if you give it 12 years—the amount of time the retailer has been around in Australia—it could achieve the same kind of ubiquity it enjoys at home here in the States. Until then, he says, just “stay tuned.”
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