Are footwear brands over priced?

A question, how many of you have been shocked by the cost of a pair of trainers on the high street these days?

I will hold my hands up and admit that I am a brand freak, I love all the latest designer brands especially all the major sports brands. I love rushing out and getting a nice shiny new pair of white trainers for the summer to go with my new summer clothes and I am a sucker for the latest designs. However, every year I notice that every pair of trainers I purchase seem to be going up in price. I went into a well known sports shop the other day to buy a nice new pair of Shox as these are my favourite trainers, I especially love the retro styles as I am a 90’s boy and always get these as my “going out trainers” but this time I got a bit of a shock when I saw how much they were.

The cost for my new pair of trainers was £109.00; I say that again “£109.00”!! You have got to be kidding me, the most I have ever paid for a new pair was £69.99 and I consider this to be far too much money anyway. But don’t get me wrong, I am not targeting one particular brand of trainer, it is all of them that are far too expensive and it seems to be all of the latest designs that seem to cost £100.00 plus, I don’t know how younger people can afford it and I’m damn sure that as a parent it would cause you concern if your child wanted to spend out this much every time they wanted to keep up with the joneses and get the latest footwear “like their friends have”.

My point is this; surely we must be getting completely ripped off by the manufactures every time we buy a pair of these trainers? I know there are things to take into consideration such as design time, innovative designs and technology etc but come on and does it really cost that much more than a standard pair of trainers you might buy from a cheaper high street supplier that charges between £30.00 - £40.00 a pair? In regards to materials it cannot cost much more to create the “latest technology” as its all plastic and leather at the end of the day.

If you look at what we get charged on the high street for everything from CD’s to jeans, I think that we get ripped off for footwear more than anything else, I bet the mark-up on the latest designs is at least 500% as we all know where they are coming from. At the end of the day it is all about the “brand” of trainer that you buy and I believe that it is less and less about the look and feel of what you are wearing, especially with current generation.

Maybe I am just getting old and starting to moan about the cost of living, kids don’t know they are born these days etc, but I think that manufacturers should not be allowed to get away with what they charge.

But like everything, unless we stop buying they will carry on selling, and none of us are going to stop buying are we?

Resources;

Footwear Industry Software company that sorted me out a cheap air of shox, nice to have friedns in the business :)