When I find a type of shoe that I like and fits my feet comfortably, I’ll end up wearing that style of shoe for years. Skechers has a make of shoe called Klone that I really like, and I’ve purchased several pairs of them over the past few years – in fact, I’ve worn the same brand and style of shoes for so long, I can’t recall what I used to wear before.
Typically I wear a pair until they start to wear out/get really dirty, then I’ll swap to a new pair. My current pair though developed a worn out shoelace – you know, that little plastic tip piece fell off – and so I needed a new pair of shoelaces. I measured the laces out that come with the shoes, and the laces were 68 inches long. Thinking I could pop into any store that sells shoelaces and find what I needed, I checked Wal-mart: nope, they don’t have that length. I checked a couple of other stores, including a shoe repair store that seemed to carry every type of laces ever made, and they didn’t have any either. It seems that the seven-hole Klones make for laces that are much longer than normal.
I was in Edmonton a couple of weeks ago, and at West Edmonton Mall I walked past a Skechers store. I thought “Aha! Shoelace victory shall be mine!” I went in and was told that they don’t sell shoelaces there. What? WHAT? The nice young women working there said that they get people coming in and wanting to buy shoelaces all the time, especially for shoes like mine that require extra-long laces, but they’re not permitted by Skechers corporate to sell shoelaces. What? WHAT? That has to be one of the dumbest things I’ve heard this month – why wouldn’t a shoe store sell shoelaces for their own shoes, especially if those shoes require laces that are difficult to buy elsewhere? This is off-the-charts stupid. The nice young women dug through a box of shoelaces they had there – perhaps from shoes they couldn’t sell – and managed to find me a pair of laces that were within a few inches of matching. Good enough I guess.
I’m sure I can find the proper laces online somewhere, but if I, as an extremely loyal Skechers shoe-wearing customer, can’t find what I need at a Skechers store, what does that say about the company and their ability/willingness to service their customers? Nothing good.
Dear Skechers, please stop being dumb.