Lakai shoes showing up at 50% off. The founders nowhere to be seen. Skate forums full of “R.I.P. Lakai” posts. It looks bad — but none of that automatically means the brand is shutting down.
This article breaks down what actually happened to Lakai between 2024 and 2025, who owns it now, where the rumors came from, and what the brand’s current status looks like based on available information.
Lakai’s Background and Why People Care
Lakai Limited Footwear was founded in 1999 by pro skaters Mike Carroll and Rick Howard. It was part of the Crailtap family, which also includes Girl Skateboards. For years, it was seen as a core, skater-owned footwear brand with a strong identity tied to skate videos and culture.
That identity matters because it set a high standard. Lakai was not just a shoe company — it was associated with skaters who built it themselves. Any change to that structure was always going to feel significant to the community.
What many people do not realize is that the founders had already lost direct control well before 2024. In 2014, Altamont Capital acquired HUF, with Lakai included in the deal. In December 2017, Altamont sold both HUF and Lakai to TSI Holdings, a large Japanese investment firm. By the time the next sale happened, Rick and Mike had not held majority ownership for several years.
The 2024 Sale to Inversal and How Close Lakai Came to Closure
On October 1, 2024, Inversal Inc. acquired Lakai. Marc Roca, the company’s CEO, announced the deal on LinkedIn and stated that he would lead a brand turnaround with input from Rick Howard and Mike Carroll.
Inversal is a firm that focuses on acquiring distressed companies — businesses that are financially struggling or on the edge of shutting down entirely. Lakai fit that profile. According to reporting from YouTube interviews and skate shop blogs, Lakai had reportedly been losing around $1 million per year. The brand had been listed for sale for years with no buyers, and was described as being weeks away from closure before Inversal stepped in.
This is an important distinction. The sale was not a planned exit or a brand being flipped for profit. It was a rescue acquisition. That context changes how you should interpret everything that followed.
What the “Lakai Is Done” Rumors Actually Come From
Three things happened around the same time, and together they created a strong impression of a brand in freefall.
First, in November 2024, an anonymous post appeared on the SLAP forum titled “Lakai is Done.” It claimed that the new owners had laid off Rick, Mike, someone named Meg, the team, and other employees. This post spread quickly across social media and skate communities. It is worth noting that the post was anonymous and unverified — it should be treated as a community report, not a confirmed announcement.
Second, Lakai ran deep clearance sales around the same period, with discounts reaching approximately 50%. For many people, that looked like a brand liquidating its inventory before shutting down.
Third, a distribution change was announced. Mosaic Distribution stated it would discontinue its partnership with Lakai by December 31, 2024, with wholesale relationships transferring to Lakai’s new ownership team — Marc, Albert, and Joaquin — starting January 1, 2025.
A Facebook group discussion offered a different explanation for the heavy discounts: Lakai was reportedly clearing old stock during a warehouse relocation, ahead of new product releases. That is a meaningful distinction. A business preparing new drops and relocating its warehouse is not the same as a business winding down.
All three signals — layoff rumors, deep discounts, and a distribution partner exit — landed at the same time. That combination is why so many people read the situation as a closure, even though no formal shutdown was announced.
Rick Howard and Mike Carroll Are No Longer in Charge
This is the part that hit the skate community hardest. By late 2024 and into 2025, multiple sources confirm that Rick Howard and Mike Carroll are no longer part of Lakai’s ownership or day-to-day leadership.
When Inversal initially acquired the brand, Rick and Mike were reportedly offered 10% ownership and compensation to remain involved. Their full departure came in the months that followed. An Instagram post from a skate news account confirmed that Rick and Mike are no longer in charge, and that Luis Mora has taken over operational control.
Here is a useful way to think about this: if a well-known restaurant is sold to new owners and the original chef leaves, regulars might say “the restaurant is dead” — even if the kitchen is still open and serving food. That is exactly the dynamic playing out with Lakai. For many skaters, Rick and Mike leaving leadership feels like the end of the brand they knew. Whether the company continues operating is a separate question.
Who Is Luis Mora and What Is His Role?
When Inversal’s CEO Marc Roca brought in Luis Mora, he initially offered him the team manager position. Mora, a pro skater and YouTuber with a following in the skate community, negotiated for something different — a percentage of ownership rather than just a management role.
That negotiation matters. It means Lakai now has a skater as a co-owner, which Inversal has framed as a way to preserve the brand’s credibility within skate culture. Whether that arrangement holds long-term remains to be seen, but it is a deliberate move to keep skater involvement in the ownership structure.
In January 2025, a new Lakai team was announced, and the brand released a seven-minute Tokyo trip video under Luis’s direction. That is a sign of active operations, not a company in the process of shutting down.
The Direct-to-Consumer Shift and Its Effects
One of Inversal’s first visible moves was taking Lakai more heavily direct-to-consumer. Shoes sold at around 50% off directly from Lakai’s website drew criticism in the skate community, particularly from core skate shops that had carried the brand for years.
For a distressed brand trying to rebuild, selling directly to customers can help financially — it cuts out distributor margins and moves inventory faster. But it comes at a cost to skate shops that rely on carrying brands like Lakai as part of their product mix. Some shop owners and skaters viewed this as Lakai turning its back on the independent shop ecosystem that supported it for decades.
This is a real tension in the turnaround story. Inversal is making decisions that make business sense for a struggling brand, but those decisions affect the broader skate retail community in ways that are genuinely felt.
Is Lakai Actually Out of Business?
Based on available information, Lakai is not formally out of business. There has been no confirmed closure announcement. The brand’s website continues to operate, new team content was released in early 2025, and the new ownership team has stated its intention to rebuild the brand.
What has changed significantly:
- Ownership transferred from TSI Holdings to Inversal Inc.
- Rick Howard and Mike Carroll are no longer in leadership or ownership roles.
- Luis Mora holds co-ownership and leads team direction.
- Mosaic Distribution ended its partnership; wholesale is now handled directly by Lakai’s new team.
- The brand shifted toward a direct-to-consumer model with heavy discounts on existing inventory.
For a business-focused perspective on how turnaround acquisitions and brand transitions typically play out, resources like OurBizPoint cover ownership changes and restructuring in accessible terms.
The honest assessment is this: Lakai as a corporate entity is still operating. But Lakai as many skaters knew it — founder-led, tied to Rick and Mike, part of the Crailtap creative world — has changed in ways that are difficult to reverse.
What This Means If You Are Thinking About Buying Lakai Shoes
If you are looking at Lakai shoes right now and wondering whether you will still get support, warranty service, or a brand that continues to release new products, the current evidence suggests the brand is still active. New content, new team, and ongoing sales all point to a company that intends to keep going.
If your concern is about supporting a skater-owned, founder-led brand, the picture is more complicated. The founders are gone. The majority owner is a turnaround investment firm. Luis Mora holds a co-ownership stake, which adds skater involvement, but the brand’s direction is now shaped by business recovery goals more than by the original skate culture ethos that made it significant.
That is not a judgment — it is just the current reality, and it is worth understanding before making a purchasing decision based on brand identity.
Final Takeaway
Lakai is not going out of business in the formal sense. But it has undergone a transformation that is significant enough to explain why so many people believe it is. A distressed acquisition, founder exits, layoff rumors, clearance sales, and a distribution overhaul all happening within a few months will naturally produce that perception.
The more accurate framing is this: the old Lakai is gone, and a restructured version is trying to find its footing under new ownership. Whether that version succeeds depends on decisions that are still being made.
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