Maybe you saw the headline news…or read it on the internet…I don’t get it. What the heck is so special about an Air Jordan tennis shoe? For goodness sakes it is just a shoe! A sneaker!
People waited at the doors of malls where the shoe would be selling for a price of $180. Sorry, but I would not spend that kind of money on a pair of shoes. Nor would I wait outside overnight in front of a mall to buy a sneaker! I could do much better with my $180, couldn’t you? The really sad part of this is that people were injured, property was damaged and fights ensued all over a shoe! And those buying these shoes, and trampling people in the malls, and damaging property, are the same folks selling the shoes on the internet for triple the price they paid. Again, this is a sneaker!
What is in the name? OK–Air Jordan: Clearly has to do with basketball celeb Michael Jordan. Let me ask those who are wearing the labels: How much are they paying you to advertise for them? Nothing? What, you wear a label and do not get paid? Hmm….free advertising for something that will more than likely not last like my Ked’s or PF flyers! Those lasted me for years as a kid, and believe me I was brutal on those shoes.
This is a sad commentary on society when a shoe creates such havoc! What people should be more concerned with are the things that really matter, like putting a roof over their heads, food on the table, and the ability to pay for their bills. Am I paying for those shoes now because the money spent on these shoes could be possibly coming from welfare? Hmm….
And shame on you to the sellers of these shoes to wait until the 23rd of December to put these shoes on sale on one day only! You created the hype; you assisted in creating the havoc, and the damage, and the injuries and you should pay for this!
This takes me to corporate greed. Yes, this is due to corporate greed. Shame on you! And it is also due to those who just had to have this shoe at a cost of $180, so, shame on you too! You forgot what was important in the message of the season. Take your shoes and put them on, and walk to the fireplace, if you have one, to the stocking hung with care. I hope that you find a lump of coal!
Life in the Foothills 
Silly me. I thought $180 on Air Jordan would have got me a flight somewhere in the middle east. Live and learn….
🙂
We have a long, long way to go to become a great society. Yesterday’s example of corporate leeches feeding on rabid, ignorant consumers further embarrasses America.
America is a great society. The rich kids in China, yes the so called communist country, also go ga ga over Air Jordans and Pocket Rockets (made by Scion, Subaru, etc), so this is not just an American thing. So please don’t be so hard on America; what is the percentage of Americans who got into a tizzy over these $180 basketball shoes? Doesn’t even register, except in the media. Those of us, and it’s a lot greater than 99%, don’t even give a damn about $180 shoes. So I think it is unfair to judge a whole nation by the actions of these ignorant consumers. And hey, cmon, Nike is just giving these people what they want. By the way, I do not own Nike stock, because I don’t believe in 75% of their products (how many different permutations of a shoe does one need anyway?); though I do own (and really like … they’re comfortable when I work out and run) Nike shoes. What did I pay for these cross training Nikes … well, they don’t have anybody’s face on it, so on sale, I bought them for $29.99 plus tax.
We are very blessed to be Americans; I am proud to tell people that I am an American. And guess what, most foreigners like us; except if we act arrogantly.
Let us not forget – these tennies are probably made in China just like all the other tennis shoes. They probably cost $1.23 to make and ship to the USA. The US company that has them made in China sells them to a distributor for $48.95. The distributor sells them for $97.90 to the stores. The stores sell them for $180.00 or more. The retail buyer places them on eBay for $500.00. The eBay buyer wins the bid, gets his new tennies, and then wishes he made more than minimum wage so he could afford them. Aren’t economics wonderful – or what?
But the upside is that the out of work repairman are being offered jobs to fix all the damage caused by the mobs at the malls all across the USA. All because of a lousy pair of tennis shoes.
What a country!
Please remember the truly important things of life (which are not tennis shoes), and Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.
ha ha ha, yeah, except, you are forgetting one thing, PJ. These are not tennis shoes. Tennis is for wimps. You hit a little fuzzy tennis ball over the net. Oh, no, these are basketball shoes. Very physical game. This is a game that is played by more people than any other sport except for soccer (futbol). From China (you should see how popular Yao Ming is over there) to Russia (many Russians play in the NBA) to the U.S.A., it is a very popular global sport, thus the money involved (billions), so yeah, if we can get the repairman some jobs, that’s great, too. ha ha
Ha ha ha, yeah, heard this and saw this on the news. First of all, they were selling for under $200 …. a bargain??? Second of all, there were only a limited amount available …. gotta have it even if it don’t fit????
And guess what, the guys in Myammar who made the shoes got paid a lot of money to make the shoes …. uh, a lot of money in Myammar that is. Like $2. Then you have to pay his/her supervisor, the guy who drove the truck through the jungles full of bandits, to the guy who had push his boat through the muddy waters in hot, humid weather, to the freighter carrying it to the port of Oakland, where the Occupiers delayed the shipment, to the FedEx driver who threw it over the fence to the chain store, to the supervisor of the store, to the salesman on the floor. Of course, there’s the profit the store has to make to cover expenses of being in the mall and the profit the company has to make to cover the Christmas bonus to the CEO, the VP of Sales, the Buyers, the designers.
This is capitalism and I am glad those guys are foolish enough to buy this stuff (and so is Michael Jordan, who gets a piece of the action for using his image). And remember that if you wear Air Jordans, your self esteem goes through the roof because nothing else seems to work. And we must really help these people with their self esteem, otherwise who knows what they might do.