CAN YOU COUNT SUCKA??

“You’re standing right now with nine delegates from 100 shoe stores. And there’s over a hundred more. That’s 20,000 hardore sneaker heads. Forty-thousand, counting affiliates, and twenty-thousand more, not organized, but ready to travel: 60,000 collectors! Now, there ain’t but 20,000 Foot Lockers in the whole country. Can you dig it?”

So I’m at my boy, Manila Ice’s, sneaker store in Hamilton the other day, and he was looking through the 2011 summer Jordans catalogue, trying to decide which merch to bring into the store. Needless to say I caught glimpses of a lot of dope product. Conversation inevitably came round to how you never hear of anyone making crazy trips just to buy a pair of sneakers anymore. A lot of the boutiques, it seems, get offered the same stock and you can just hop online to find any kicks that may have evaded you, in the past.

We got to thinking how dope it would be if sneaker boutiques co-ordinated what they bought to set up that sort of climate again. Like each province takes a certain style or colorway and won’t do any online transactions for it – you actually have to go there to buy it. Like an Amazing Race for Footwear. Around The World in 80 J’s.

So whaddya say? Shall we put some excitement back into This Thing Of Ours? We all know the game ain’t what it used to be (First Goodfoot closed up, then North Trooper closed up…). Anyone who happens to read this and is in touch with a boutique owner, get them to holla. It might just be us bugging, but it could be fun and at the same time help to generate some money for your local independent sneaker store too…

CAN YOU DIG IIIIIIT??