Shoes in the News

Christian Louboutin was recently quoted as saying that about 3,000 women worldwide each have over 500 pairs of his shoes. But the prize for top customer has to go to Danielle Steel who owns at least 6,000 pairs of his fabulous red soled heels. In related news, Mariah Carey had to build a special closet to house her 1000 pairs of shoes.

About the same time Danielle was picking up her 6000th pair of Louboutins, Permuto, an online performance advertising company, released survey results claiming the average U.S. woman now owns 27 pairs of shoes. And that's up from an average of 19 pairs as recently as September of 2007 when Consumer Reports National Research Center questioned 1,057 women about their footwear. The women said they wear only four pairs regularly and 15 percent admitted to having over 30 pairs.

Do Danielle and Mariah get included in those survey numbers? Because if they do, some of us are in danger of running around barefoot. Actually, 80% of us own up to having 11 pairs or more, and 40% of women told the Permuto pollsters that they own more than 50 pairs. The average American woman in 1941 owned five pairs of shoes, and that was before war rationing reduced purchases to three pairs of leather shoes a year. What's behind today's shoe frenzy? Perhaps it's the options we have now both in purchasing opportunities and styles.

Blue Laws forced most shoe shops to close on Sundays in 1941. Not only do stores now stay open on Sundays, but also Internet sales are booming. In 2007, $3.3 billion shoes were sold online, in 2008 it was up to $4.3 billion and last year, sales are estimated to have totaled over $5 billion. That's a lot of traffic.

Almost every style popularized or rediscovered in the twentieth century is available again this season, and innovations are trotted out regularly. Rubber soled shoes that were going to be called Peds were renamed Keds and sold by U. S. Rubber beginning in 1917. Now we have thousands of styles and shapes of sneakers. The fastest growing segment of the women's sneaker market is Toners, sneakers reputed to shape and tone your legs and butt while you walk.

In the twenties, the strap was the thing. T-straps made it easy to dance the night away without worrying about your shoes. And in the thirties, sandals emerged from the days of old Rome to serve as beach shoes, then party shoes and finally fancy dress shoes. In the forties we had rationing, only six colors of shoes available, and the rationing board kept heel heights to one inch or less!  

It's no wonder that colorful, highly embellished shoes were the rage in the post-war fifties. In 1951 Charles Jourdan designed and sold the first stiletto.  The sixties brought more pumps and slender -heeled shoes and then there were the go-go boots, often in plastic, leather or fake leather. In the seventies we saw clogs, wedges, platforms, stilettos, and ballet flats. The eighties brought a touch of the masculine as we all dressed for success in our pumps and sling backs. I loved those man-styled wing-tip pumps. Peep toe shoes also made a stand during that time.

The nineties continued with an anything goes vibe from the daintiest sandal to Doc Martens and UGGS with dresses. Birkenstocks defined a whole lifestyle.

The future of shoe styling continues to evolve. High-end brands such as Jimmy Choo have identified a place in the market for a 'value-conscious consumer' who will buy rubber-soled flats for $365. And a rash of young companies: innovators such as O'Couture, an Orange county shoe manufacturer with two shoe styles and dozens of ways to make those shoes look unique, http://www.ocouture.us/ and Plattoes, a sandal company that sells five soles and countless yards of ribbon and trinkets to make them unique and fun, http://www.plattoes.com/.

Eco-friendly materials such as recyclable plastic are worked into exceedingly stylish footwear by Vivienne Westwood and Melissa, http://www.melissa.com.br/en. Or the minimal and comfortable, Topless Sandal, allows you to forget that strap between the toes, and be practically barefoot. With a stickiness something like post-it notes, the sole-only sandals are guaranteed to stick for a year but leave no gooey residue. Check them out, http://www.topless-sandal.com/.

Women have always loved shoes, but haven't always had the closets to accommodate their passion. If you have a big closet and lots of shoes, do be aware that people are apt to exaggerate. As poor Imelda Marcos was forced to explain, "I did not have three thousand pairs of shoes, I had one thousand and sixty."