Can we just talk about the INSANITY that is the price of children’s shoes?
Because last weekend I was thisclose to thinking it was actually rational to spend $40 on a pair of CLEARANCE priced shoes for my 3 year old who will outgrow them in 4 months. But then? I remembered that I can’t remember the last time I spent even close to that on a pair of shoes for ME, a grown woman who will wear them FOREVER… or at least keep them in her closet forever, as evidenced by the pile of shoes in my “shoe room,” as Kendall calls it, that I nearly kill myself on every day.
Oh, sure, they have “growing feet” that need “special support” and “flexible insoles” and all that other bullshit. The children’s shoe industry has us by the balls, friends.
Okay, let me clarify that a little. The shoe industry has parents of children with girthy feet by the balls. Because those of you who birthed tots with dainty feet that don’t look at all like dinner rolls can get by with the $12 sandals at Target. Meanwhile, I have to spend more than I do on date night (that one time that happened) with my husband on a pair supposedly on clearance.
Seriously. She could kill small dogs with those feet.
Sure, I’ve known all this for a while, and I use the tricks like buying them at the outlet store or looking for just the right XXW size at consignment sales, which is about as easy as finding a raisin in a poopy diaper, but I have scored a few times… with the shoes, not the raisin… that was an odd analogy that has never actually played out in real life.
Now, though, I have two with Yabba-Dabba-Do feet (as coined by Aunt Kelly), and even the “sale” prices x2 are a little extreme.
Honestly, I’m mainly bothered by the PRINCIPAL of it all. They are shoes. For children. And I’m quite confident children don’t need this fancy-schmancy technology to learn to walk properly so much that they can justify their prices. Look at all of us! Quite capable of the walking thing as grown ups… when we are sober, AND I BET MOST OF US DIDN’T EVEN WEAR SHOES.
I mean, I could be wrong, I guess. We could have a future generation of very proficient walkers on our hands thanks to their medical miracle shoes, but I’m willing to take that chance. Who’s going to need to walk 10 years from now anyway? Aren’t we all just going to turn into floating blobs like on Wall-E who make computers do everything for us? I will pay $40 to buy my kids’ names.com because THAT shit is important for their future. Not shoes.
And while I’m on my little tirade, let me just address the RACKET that is calling $6 off a $45 pair of shoes a CLEARANCE SALE. No. That is not even a SALE, fuckers. That is, like, what? 12% off??
Hey, folks! Come on down and take advantage of our HUGE clearance sale! A whopping TWELVE PERCENT OFF! Take the money you save and spend it at Auntie Anne’s Pretzels next door… on a pretzel… not the lemonade, though. It won’t quite be enough to cover that. BUT! Your child will have very fancy shoes and you can console yourself knowing you got them on CLEARANCE.
I’m sorry. I need to take a few deep breaths. This is obviously a hot topic for me that is very close to my heart, which is sort of close to my wallet.
All I’m asking is for the cheap companies to make some shoes that I can shove my fat-footed children’s feet into without contemplating amputating just one of their toes to make them fit. I don’t WANT to give the expensive, highly “advanced” shoe people my money. I simply have very little choice.
And for those of you wondering about the store I speak of, I’m not going to name names, but I will say I strode rite out of there when I came to my senses and ordered 2 pairs for less than the cost of one of their “clearance” priced pairs from FamousFootwear.com with a coupon I got from Blissdom. BOOM.
Kendall is 3 years 10 months old and Leyna is 14 months old