If the shoe fits, whore it.

A "something's wrong with this picture" hunch reveals yet another nefarious plot to screw the consumer.

I used to be able to walk into any sporting goods store and find narrow-width running shoes that actually fit.  This ended several years ago when the chain stores unilaterally stopped carrying narrow widths, and I had to start buying my shoes at high-end specialty stores and via the internet.  A few weeks ago in frustration, I re-checked one of the larger chains and counted ONE HUNDRED AND TEN different models of womens running shoes for sale, NOT ONE of which was narrow. 

Something about this situation kept nagging at the back of my mind, so while shopping yesterday, I set about closely examining all 110 pairs, approximately 30 of which were offered by my favorite manufacturer which shall remain nameless, and guess what I found?  There actually WAS a narrow-width shoe concealed in that collection - it was just tagged as a medium width.

Why would they do this?!? 

Because narrow-width shoes are considered a "specialty product" and are correspondingly very expensive - two to three times the cost of a comparable-quality shoe by the same manufacturer.   If they reserve those shoes for higher-end stores, they can demand MUCH more money while incurring NO additional manufacturing cost.  Yet simultaneously they don't necessarily want to lose ALL sales from the hoarde of mainstream middle-class consumers, so if they put the same shoe in the chain store but call it "medium", some of those consumers are going to stumble upon it and buy it simply because - surprise - it fits. 

So they sell the same product using two different representations in a way that maximizes profit.  At the expense of the well-heeled (pun intended) consumer, of course, who gets suckered into going the high-dollar route when she can't find the product in the mainstream.

And the fact that they call a "narrow" shoe a premium product but leave the "wide" ones openly advertized on the lower-priced shelves is no accident, either.  Sloth doesn't sell and, as Lawrence pointed out to me the other day, the idealized female form has been steadily progressing from the "fat goddess" archetype that was exalted when food was in short supply...

...to the lean, muscled trendsetter now that food is so over-available that it has risen to the level of being a systemic poison.

Only wealthier women have the means to attain that form (and they have thinner feet as a result of it), because it takes TIME, and time is money. And money is what they want - from us, the women whom they know full well have it to spend on their shoes. 

So I'm onto them now, those cash-vacuuming cretins, having finally outsmarted them at their own game and, with luck, I'll never have to pay $100 for another pair of narrow-width running shoes that should cost $40, like the ones I bought yesterday. 

Geez, the crap I have to go through just to jog with a dog...

(clipart courtesy of Microsoft;

famous fat goddess pic

courtesy of just about anyone)