Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Tom's Shoes

So here's how I found out about Tom's Shoes:
I work at a Jewish center sorting clothes. During one of the meetings, a woman raised her hand out of the blue and said "I want to tell you all something really good about a company called Tom's Shoes..." and she went into the story of its foundation.

The inspiration, as told by the website:

"In 2006 an American traveler, Blake Mycoskie, befriended children in Argentina and found they had no shoes to protect their feet. Wanting to help, he created a company that would match every pair of shoes sold with a pair given to a child in need. One for One. Blake returned to Argentina with a group of family, friends and staff later that year with 10,000 pairs of shoes made possible by caring TOMS customers."

The shoes are a bit expensive given what alpargatas cost in Argentina ($10) , but with $40 covering two pairs it's worth the cost. The company has hippie principles like giving, donation, helping the poor and whatnot, but the shoes are cute, not some horrible military green hemp creation like you might expect. I once met a horrible hipster girl recently arrived from the USA and she was wearing Tom's. Must be "in" nowadays?

Here are some of my favorites:


For sailors...or hipster sailor wannabees.
Clown shoes? Maybe, but I would still wear them.
Reminds me a bit of those flags that people use to communicate.

1 comment:

  1. I want to like Tom's shoes sooo bad, but everytime I try them on they fit way weird for $40 shoes. I'd rather give $20 to charity and go buy other shoes that are cuter, but hey, if it's getting people to give money that wouldn't already, I suppose it's good. I just wish they were more comfortable.

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