Outside the cubical thinking

Ok, so I talk a lot about feet and shoes. No its not a fetish. Business in America, and around the world really, has lost a lot of its innovation. Big business won't invest in something unless there's a 90% chance that they'll make their money back plus 20%. The reason is they run so inefficiently they have to do that just to move the stock price up a tad and keep from getting bought out. European socialist countries started backing their big corporations so that they could be more competitive globally through using economies of scale.

Anyway, America was forced to do likewise or risk having all US corps bought out by foreign interests. Well the jokes on us, because once a corp goes international it generally has very little loyalty to the nation that birthed it. The loser in all this is small business and that's where we all lose. Small business runs efficiently, therefore on a narrower margins. Small business will often thrive in bad economies although you couldn't prove it now, because big business is given bail out money to buy up smaller competitors and close them down. Government also loves to tax small business to pay for tax breaks it gives companies like GE. GE needs the money so they can contribute to the Obama campaign. It's all a big circle...ok back to shoes.

The problem with big business is a lack of creativity they simply don't do a good job of R and D anymore. They fail to see the opportunities in the problems they face (because they aren't forced to face them anymore). I was speaking with a young grey-hat the other day and was surprised to hear him point out that its easier to steal movies than to buy them. I thought about it and its true. Hollywood is so busy sueing everyone they haven't figured out a way to bring there product to market that isn't a buggy hassle.

Well not everyone is stuck in the cubical mentality. Once in awhile someone steps outside and thinks, "I bet there's a customer who's needs aren't being met." In shoes this means companies like Vibram or these guys http://www.gizmag.com/split-toed-suction-cup-shoes/21808/?utm_source=Gizmag+Subscribers&utm_campaign=777d5a65fe-UA-2235360-4&utm_medium=email

Shoe Rants and Raves

So the topic of shoes is really close to my heart. My left foot is a half size shorter than my right foot, but its a half size wider. Both my feet are shaped like a ducks. I seriously have feet that are 5 E's wide...well the right ones 5 E's. I've had trouble finding shoes that fit my entire life. Of course its a blessing in someways, for one thing I think it started me down the road of thinking outside the box. I wondered why, if there were customers wanting to buy shoes in my size, why no one was making them. It's a failure on the part of business in America today, and of course the consumer always shares in the blame.

If Temperance Brenen were here she could determine my nationality by the freaky shape of my feet (which is Pictish, BTW). How? Well as it turns out there's less then ten basic shapes of foot. It makes sense, right, there's a "Roman" nose, why wouldn't there be a "Roman" foot. Well there is, so do shoe makers design a shoe for the Roman foot? Of course not! Because only a small percentage of us shoe buyers chooses a shoe for comfort and durability. The rest of you pick a shoe because Micheal Jordan said to.

Lets run some numbers on Nike. As of 2006 Nike could manufacture a pare of shoes for $7. They paid factory workers in Indonesia and Viet Nam $1.50 a day (cost of living there is $4.50 a day). The average factory worker is female age 17 to 35 and works around 500 hours of overtime each year. Nike paid Micheal Jordan more than they paid all of the workers at all 6 factories in Indonesia. And to top it all off, do you think you can walk into a store with feet the size of Mr. Jordan's and buy a pare of shoes that fit? Nope! They only really sell a small range of sizes. In other industries this is called false advertizing, but...

At the extreme far end of the spectrum is the San Antonio Shoe Company. SAS designs, manufactures and sell entirely in the US. You can't even buy their shoes online because they think you should actually get your feet measured before buying a shoe. I own a pare and they are expensive, BUT, they look as good as new and they are 3 full years old. I think I can probably get 5 years out of them which means they are actually cheaper per year than Air Jordan's, which only last about a year.

Ultimately the problem is far greater than sweat shops and consumerism. In a life time we'll walk the equivalent of circling the globe 3 times. Each step can take our back out of line, cause knee and hip joint wear, or worse it hurts so bad we don't walk, which is a very natural, cheap and effective way to stay healthy. You can now have a custom home built but it costs almost as much to get a custom pare of shoes built.

The ultimate answer may be here soon, but in the mean time buy SAS shoes.

Five Toe Sandals

I like going barefoot over shoes. Mainly because my feet are wide. In fact I think Nike should be barred from having basketball players make ads for them because they don't actually make shoes that fit a basketball players feet.

Regardless I thought these sandals were cool and made sense.