In recent years we’ve seen an increasing amount of sales in the section of quality welted footwear. Something that once was a rare sight is now the norm, and albeit retailers and brands obviously have their part, a lot comes down to customer behaviour and how people rather “make a steal” and buy a bunch of pairs on sale than get what they really want and need at full price. This new environment is putting many retailers and brands at serious strain, where some go under. If you really want to support a retailer or a brand – buy full price.
The problem was painfully obvious when Alfred Sargent went into liquidation earlier this year. Many shoe lovers shared their sadness about the news, how they loved their AS Exclusive and Handgrade shoes, thought they were among the best-bang-for-the-buck stuff one could get, and questioned why they had been so hard to get a hold off. Then as discussions went on, it became clear that a lot of these guys, in fact most of them, had gotten their Sargents at various sales and campaigns, often from the British retailer who was sort of the main retailer of AS Exclusive and also Handgrade shoes. So – one thought it was sad that a company went bust and couldn’t understand why their shoes weren’t made more available, they were such a great value. Said by the same persons who waited for the coming sales or discount code-campaigns to get a hold of their AS pairs. You see the irony here?
Other examples of this mentality is shown all the time. It’s certainly not exclusive for this section of products, but, well, that’s what I write about here, so. Nowadays in discussions in social media, on websites or forums, when certain brands are mentioned folks state the sales prices as more or less their “actual price”. One compare one brands RRP (recommended retail price) with another ones sales price. When one talk about coming purchase it’s mentioned that “I will see what will be part of the sale from xxx this autumn and get that”. Folks express how they are getting a bunch of pairs on various sales since “the deals was too good to pass on”, while expressively saying that they really were after something else. And so on.
Looking at the classic quality shoes segment, say, a decade ago or so, things were rather different. Since this is a niche where most brands don’t work with seasonal collections, but rather a bunch of models that are part of a more or less permanent collection, there’s not the same “need” for sales to clear out stuff that won’t be produced again and/or that won’t sell since they are “out of fashion”, as for many other segments within clothing and footwear. Also the status for many of these brands were high, in some cases demand were bigger than access. I remember when I started Shoegazing in 2012, there of course were sales on welted shoes here and there, especially during the two sales seasons, but they were rather an exception than rule for most retailers and brands, and the sales that did run usually consisted of a limited number of models and sizes.
Today things are totally different, as all of you know. The amount of sales of quality shoes have increased steadily through the years, and totally boomed now during the pandemic. The fact that many retailers and brands have been forced to run sales simply to maintain their liquidity, as the whole world halted in uncertainty and change of life (home interiors and similar boomed, but again, that’s for another blog to cover). But what I’m talking about in this article was there already before Covid hit. Not least with the increasing competition, it’s become a solution many cater towards. As mentioned before, retailers and brands have their part in being on this route, but to a large extent it’s due to customer behaviour and trying to match this, and that’s what I focus on today. The retailers and brands part in this (like how brands undercut retailers with offering heavy discounts when they sell direct to consumers, discounts that are very hard for a retailer to keep up with) is for another article.
I can surely understand that grabbing a bargain and getting stuff heavily discounted is attractive, and I’m surely part of this whole thing with highlighting various sales in articles here on Shoegazing. I know you readers appreciate these articles, and I’m not late on accommodating this. The problem is when almost all you do is hunting for sales and shopping discounts. When retailers and brands sell more and more of their stock on sales, since that’s when customers come to shop, it goes without saying that the amount of money they make on each pair becomes much less (this in a sector that already from the start has relatively low margins, more on that in this article). And here we have this classic downward winding spiral, where the retailers and brands sell less at RRP and “need” to offer more at sale to get their finances together, customers focus even more on sales going forward, and on it goes.
There’s sure cases where you might not find a product worthy it’s RRP, and cases where you get lucky and find exactly what you are looking for at a discount perhaps even from a brand you wouldn’t afford otherwise. However, as I wrote earlier, too often it’s clear that people rather get stuff more or less just to make a steal than anything else, where one buy a bunch of shoes that are almost what one is looking for on sales instead of what one really is looking for at full price, and so on (something that often hits back on you later on, on top of it all). A common explanation is “I wouldn’t be able to afford this otherwise”, this do often comes from folks who have like 20 pairs of shoes “they wouldn’t be able to afford” if not on sale, though… It’s a free world, you can of course go ahead with this approach. But as Derek Guy puts it in this sarcastic Put This On article, this often doesn’t add up, and we have these “I Can’t Believe They’re Going Out Of Business,” Says A Man Who Never Pays Full Price”-folks everywhere.
If one truly appreciate something, it’s my view that one have a responsibility to actually buy things at full price, maybe not always, but as a rule. If not customers of a brand have this responsibility, who would have? This will be extra important the coming year, as shoe businesses come out of harsh times and potential governmental support, rent cuts etc are removed. I’ve said it before (in this article here on helping the shoe industry), that now if ever is the time to support the retailers and brands that we find important, this year and likely beginning of 2022 as well will be where many companies future existence will be dependant on it, on all of us who love what they do. The price we’d have to pay by only shopping sales might not be worth it, we have to see the bigger picture, and look further than just down on our own shiny toe caps.
What’s your view on this? Do share and discuss in the comments field below.
100% with you on this Jesper and even more so since the pandemic!
150% in agreement. This shoemaker needed wider distribution probably on a digital platform. I would have been happy to pay full price. This is how we keep Artisans in business creating merchandise for our enjoyment.
Absolutely. It’s the same thing when people lament that their high street shops are shutting down … and don’t make the connection that it’s because they’ve been shopping at Amazon. If you don’t feed the goose, you can’t expect it to keep laying the golden eggs!
One thing I’ve learned since entering the high-end shoe market 18 months ago is that buying a full price can be a fulfilling and educational experience. When shopping for a particular pair, I’ve been pleasantly surprised at the high level of customer service. As often as not, the owner or manager reaches out to me to verify and clarify (Michael Baldinger, Justin FitzPatrick, George and Lisa at Cleverley, Ioannis at Corthay, Kostas, the Vietnam shoemakers, etc.) Without fail, they teach me something. And they always seem to know more about my feet than I do. I have yet to be steered wrong on a sizing suggestion. Five years from now as you are polishing up a pair, You likely won’t remember what you paid for the shoes. But you will be well aware of the quality and fit., and if you really like the shoe.
These are true words.
There seems to be some stores where constant sales are an integrated part of their business models – adding to the downwards spiral, causing other stores to need to follow up.
Quality and expertise has a cost. Purchasing something because it’s cheap, and not because it’s what you want, might be the worst reason for buying anything. May very well lead to a bad and little used wardrobe.
^^^Glad to see many agree! Though of course I can respect those that don’t, with the right arguments for themselves 🙂
It’s indeed a lot of value brought by good retailers and brand representatives, something that one shouldn’t take for granted. As long as all who can do their part to support an industry one find important, I’m hopeful for the future!
Great article, and I am all in agreement. In any profession, the hagglers who want the bargain are the worst for any industry. BUT, the shoemakers have to some extent shot themselves in the foot by having multiple prices in different markets. The consumer knows the price in other markets is different, and hence started to haggle on price. If prices were set at a standard level, then this haggling would disappear. Take GG – their shoes of the old standard line was up to Yen 200,00 in Japan (Thats $1800 or so), EG too have had exorbitant prices in Japan. StC even stopped overseas retailers from selling to Japan based customers. So, faced with these prices the consumer starts to look for the bargains. In luxury goods recently, World wide prices are conmon – a Rolex or Cartier bought in Dudai or Shangai is much the same (save for taxes), but this is not the case with shoes. Sure, leather import taxes exist in Japan, but the price differential still is too high. So, a case that shoe makers may have brought this upon themselves I wonder…!?
I think there should be caveats applied to this.
If I buy direct from the manufacturer, which I do in most cases, then the manufacturers RRP includes the substantial (100% ? ) mark up that shops demand and need for their own operation.
So, instead of selling a £300 shoe to a retailer for £150 with a relatively modest profit they will be receiving £300 for it And the manufacturers online operation will be substantially cheaper than running bricks and mortar stores.
So, if I buy Loake Export grade shoes (for example) for under £200 from the Loake factory outlet, instead of £360 RRP, then I don’t believe that I am significantly impacting the manufacturer. It should be noted that Loake, Barker etc only sell “perfect” shoes online.
I may be impacting retailers but as there is only one high end retailer near me (in the city), with limited stock and I take a large size, they would most likely have to order in the shoe for me, something that I can happily do online myself.
Reply to unknown user:
If the manufacturer sells the product in their own store (say Jermyns Street), they will need to carry the same costs as other retailers.
They will but as the majority of the UK population does not live in the South East or near London then we are most likely to purchase via the internet or incur significant additional costs travelling (and accomodation in my case). Other than Loake (Brogue Trader) there is no nationwide spread of stores in the UK that sell these brands. When these brands have a UK wide retail presence then I will happily purchase from the stores . And, in my case, taking a size 12, most of the independent retailers that I can see online only go up to size 11 now. Honourable exceptions being Herring and AFPOS.
Even respected retailers like Pediwear pretty much hold nothing in size 12 in stock and where they do offer it, they order it in from the manufacturer which is something that I can do quite happily myself.
I have bought multiple pairs of shoes directly from Barkers, Loake, Cheaney & NPS and I’m pretty sure I have given them far more profit, even at sale prices, than if I had purchased in an independent retailer.
I agree that the shoe industry does need to sell a large amount of their output at full price so that they can remain a going concern.
But the industry does face other issues. First and foremost men are no longer required to wear dress shoes to the office. This has cut the amount of shoes required by a tremendous amount. Secondly there has been an explosion of shoe brands that have come to the market. 20 years ago brands like Gaziano & Girling, JFitzPatrick, etc didn’t exist. Knowledge of Yohei Fukuda without the internet would never have reached me. Now perhaps all these new Asian brands appearing will encourage a new generation of Asian office workers to adopt dress shoes and the market will grow.
I also think there is a limit to the number of dress shoes the vast majority of men would choose to own. I started buying good quality dress shoes, as opposed to High Street brands, in 2014 and have already amassed 12 pairs, that’s definitely more than I need. But I appreciate the style, craft and appearance. I’ve bought full price, sale & from factory shops. I think there’s a reasonable argument for factory shop/sample sale purchases as it allows the brand to recoup funds for shoes it wouldn’t sell as new.
At the end of the day, the market will have to adapt to the buying public’s tastes.
I’ll add that I see that in the future many of these higher end manufacturers will adopt the Crown Northampton business model where you order the shoes you want from a menu of leather and sole types and they are then built to order. That way the customer has the perception of higher value as he has his own custom build and because the shoes are made to order there is no surplus stock produced that is later sold at sale prices.
And to emphasise the last point, I have often seen both Barkers and Loake offering significantly discounted (perfect) shoes on their factory outlet websites while at the same time offering the exact same shoes in the same colours at full price on their main website. The only difference is that the RRP (before discount) price quoted is a little lower on the outlet site indicating that these were produced a year or two ago (by law they have to quote the original price)
Peter: Yeah, as I mention retailers/brands have their part in this as well, to varying extent, but it’s another article to cover that.
Unknown user: There’s always reasonable exceptions. However, you again have to see the bigger picture of things. If you buy a shoe on sale directly from the retailer, sure, you sort of pay that brand a similar amount as what the retailer bought the shoes for (generalising here, exact amounts of course depends on number of things). But if that’s done to a larger extent then retailers obviously are the ones losing out, and many brands are highly dependant on their retailers. They stand for a solid, relatively predictable income which is the base for a lot of classic shoe brand’s existence. Not to mention the service that these provide to customers around the world. You can read more about the importance of retailers in this article: https://shoegazing.com/2021/03/26/reflection-the-strength-with-retailers/
So indirectly you may very well support the brand just as little with this approach as when buying on sales from a retailer.
Misbah: Sure, I’ve written about the increased competition, the reasons for it and its affect on the classic shoe industry, positive and negative, a number of times here on Shoegazing, and also mentions this in the article. This article focus on something else though. And as you say, sure, “the market will have to adapt to the buying public”, but the “buying public” needs to understand that their way of doing things may lead to “the market” disappearing, to some extent, they can’t come complaining later on when they miss something that disappeared due to their way behaviour.