Shoe buzz at Minnehaha

Emerging recently from the shadows is a new phenomenon: shoes. Shoes have been around for a very long time, dating all the way back to 8000 B.C. However, just in the past decade, social media has made the whole idea of shoes shift from necessity to accessory. 

Nowadays, there are various different websites to purchase shoes off of. Whether it is GOAT, StockX, DHGate or Nike (just to name a few), shoes are now viewed as a very important aspect of a person’s life.  

Emerging in the past years has been the rapidly growing interest in designer shoes. Not just the brands like Louis Vuitton and Gucci, but more frequently brands like Nike, Air Jordan and Adidas. 

Take a look in our very own vibrant halls here at Minnehaha, and you will find the same. Lots of interest in the shoes that are on feet. 

There are many different stories that students of Minnehaha have surrounding shoes, whether it is the purchase of shoes specifically or even selling shoes.

Sophomore Fitta Jafar has developed a particular interest in shoes in the past couple of years.

“One time, someone stole almost 500 dollars from me.” Jafar said, referencing a scamming incident that had happened just over a year ago. 

“I went to go meet a seller at the mall,” said Jafar, “And they just never showed up.”

After paying online for his shoes off of a shoe selling website, he had ventured to meet up to go get his brand new pair of Jordans.

Why would someone do that? You may ask. Well, the answer is pretty simple. Shoes are now seen as a way to make money. When you combine the sense of pride that people feel with shoes along with the raging prices that many of these shoes can cost, you now have a money making product. Along with this comes greediness, which leads people to bend the law trying to use shoe selling to their advantage

Many people think that this sense of pride and significance of shoes nowadays is a new thing, but in reality people have been passionate over shoes for many, many years. 

Just in the past few months, some of the biggest news headlines have been rooted from the topic of shoes. 

Last August, a big sneaker reseller called “Zadeh Kicks” was called out for cheating buyers for upwards of millions of dollars. Malekzadeh, the owner of Zadeh Kicks was found to have scammed customers of 70 million dollars.

Before a big drop of Nike 11 Cool Grey shoes, Zadeh has already promoted that he was selling these shoes for just over half of the price, which enticed many buyers into buying them.   Zadeh sold over 600,000 pairs of those shoes, while only actually having 6,000, scamming thousands of people.

The FBI was sent to investigate him and since then they have seized over 6 million dollars in cash as well as some of his most prized possessions. 

Now, schemes this large are obviously not common, and not every shoe reselling business has ill intent. 

Although scamming is definitely prevalent in our world today, students of Minehaha have a very different view and interesting variety of experiences rooted in shoes. Senior Matt Sorenson runs his very own shoe resale business.

When reflecting on how he got into shoes, Sorensen said, “I have always loved shoes as a kid, but I knew I needed to make money in order to buy shoes, so I started selling them.”

There are many challenges that comes with selling shoes, such as finding the right buyer, selling the right product and making sure you are sharp with the sizes of the shoes. 

“Sometimes it is hard to find the right buyer that will pay the price that you mark [the shoes] at,” said Sorenson, “and also stocking shoes in the right sizes.”

There are various ways that someone can sell shoes. There are the well known sites, like mentioned before, but there are also more low-key ways to sell shoes.

“I used to have my own Facebook page to sell shoes. But now I have decided to stick to selling them to people that I know.” Said Sorenson.

It can be hard to find the happy medium. When selling shoes to other people, you see many different sides of what people are doing with their shoes, and sometimes there are some weird stories that come along with it.

“One time somebody sent me a not complaining about a scuff on the back of the shoe.” Said Sorenson.

Keep in mind, people get very particular over any marks on their shoes,

“I knew that there wasn’t actually a scuff on the shoe and asked [the buyer] to send me a picture,” said Sorenson, “and he sent me a picture of a whole different shoe.”

After this, the buyer even sent the shoes back and cut off all contact with Sorenson and his business. How random!

Living in the halls of Minnehaha are various students that just flat out enjoy shoes.

There is a good mix between what types of shoes people care about here. Not only are the stereotypical, popular Adidas or Jordan shoes, but oftentimes especially in the winter more shoes for comfort. 

“My favorite shoes are Uggs,” says first-year Sinae Hill,  “Because they are comfy and they keep my feet warm.”  

Uggs are an example of shoes that have been on the rise in the past couple of years. The model “Tasman” can be seen in bulk across the commons. 

Sure, everyone has shoes, but why do some people care about their shoes more than others, you may be asking. 

“I care about what shoes I wear because I don’t want to walk around with ugly shoes on my feet,” says Hill.

Similarly, Sophomore Kingston Manning thinks, “I just want my shoes to look fresh and match my outfits.” 

But not everyone has such a special interest in shoes. 

Junior TJ Cusciotta remarks, “I really don’t care about what shoes I wear, it just doesn’t matter as much to me.” 

Regardless, shoes are a raging phenomenon in today’s world, so next time you are walking around, look to the ground!