Saturday, March 14, 2009
Vans: Introduction
Vans Shoes are an American icon due simply to their originality. The company was founded here and stayed here longer than any other. Not only that but the company embraced new sports like boarding and BMX, making them the shoes of a new generation. These shoes produced are something that people have the freedom to make their own. Thus making Vans shoes not just an obsession but a part of self expression.
Friday, March 13, 2009
Vans: Art
Vans Shoes have always been something very original and creative. The shoes are plain with a style that the wearer can amp up whichever way they choose. Vans (like mine pictured above) come in so many different styles and the company encourages people to deck out their shoes to their personality, and offers custom made shoes. But, whether you wear some plain canvas Vans or ones you hand painted yourself over the summer, these shoes transform before your eyes to become not just something you wear, but a part of your personal expression...that you can wear.
Thursday, March 12, 2009
(bellis)
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Vans: Interview
Interview With Steve Van Doren.
So when did the Vans open the doors for business?
Well they were building the factory throughout 1965 and they had ‘Opening January!’ painted on the front but it wasn’t ready. This was the year of Maxwell Smart so they had ‘Would you believe February’ added to the sign, but it actually opened I believe on the first day of March, 1966. The factory, the office, and the retail store were all located at 704 East Broadway.
How did the custom making of shoes come about?
In the women’s area, a lady came in and said ‘that’s a nice pink but I really want a brighter pink’ and then she picked up the yellow shoe and said ‘that’s a nice yellow but it really is too light’. My dad thought to himself, for crying out loud I can’t afford to carry 5 different colours of pink. So he said lady, ‘why don’t you get a piece of fabric, whatever colour pink you want, bring it back and I’ll make a shoe for you’. So it was almost the first day that they started charging extra to do a custom pair of shoes.
When did the company realize it was developing a following with skateboarders?
Santa Monica and Manhattan Beach is where they started coming in and custom making shoes. In the very beginning we sold tons of the #44 blue deck shoes. Then the custom orders started coming in, and it started with just red and blue. We let that run for a few months then we came up with a stock shoe - navy blue, gold, navy blue and then brown, beige, brown. We would watch the customs and make brown/ beige/ brown if everybody ordered it as a custom. You had school colours, team colours, skaters and bmx kids who came in the late 70’s and those guys really liked the wild colours. There was no leather around until 76/77 when we finally came up with the Old School which had leather in the toe and heel because skaters were wearing hell out of them. Leather would last a long time, longer than anything else. The outsole never wore out, the side wall of the material would never wear out, they could get it down to where there was just a little bit of fabric but the sides would still be good.
Where did the slip-on idea come from?
The company my dad worked for before made a slip on; he interpreted into our own style, number #48. It was actually a slip on with a non-skid sole for boating. Our 40th anniversary is coming up next year and we are going to be bringing back style #45 which has a blue top and a blue sole designed for gripping.
The checkerboard slip-on is probably the most recognised of all the Vans styles how did they come about?
In the late seventies I was now out of high school and I noticed kids were taking the side profile off the shoe, where the white rubber was, and colouring it in checkerboard. So the first thing we did was start making rubber with the checks on it and eventually we made some canvas. Right at the same we had a PR lady named Betty Mitchell and Universal Studio’s asked Betty for some shoes. So she sent a whole lot of checkerboard shoes for the movie Fast Times at Ridgemont High, we had no idea.
They liked them so much they ended up on the album cover and then Sean Penn, or Jeff Spicoli in the movie, was hitting him self over the head with the shoes in the movie. It was magic because we sold millions of checkerboards. My Dad didn’t really want to sell shoes outside of California and now he had no choice as people everywhere wanted our shoes!
What does the future hold for Vans?
We’re never going to have air pockets like Air Jordans and stuff like that, so we have to get creative with the materials. The thing that hasn’t come back totally yet are all the fun, crazy things we did with prints. That’s an area that still has a long run for us.
It seems hard to get support for a new idea unless its retro inspired. Is it hard to come out with something fresh and original in sneakers?
I know Grant who is our head designer, has a really great idea but I’d have to kill you if I told you. He’s got something that’s not that easy, that he’s been working on for a year and a half. If he comes through with it, it’s really going to be cool. There’s also a new line called Syndicate. We just showed it at ASR, it was on a corner parking lot under a big army tent. It’s got 4 or five different styles, the Half Cab is one, the Old School is one. There is tattoo art on an Authentic, it looks great. These are packaged really cool and it’s a special brand just for our best, core skate shops.
Just to finish off, what shoe would you pick to sum up what Vans is all about?
The Checkerboard Slip-on. People buy them to go do their weddings
(History of Vans)
So when did the Vans open the doors for business?
Well they were building the factory throughout 1965 and they had ‘Opening January!’ painted on the front but it wasn’t ready. This was the year of Maxwell Smart so they had ‘Would you believe February’ added to the sign, but it actually opened I believe on the first day of March, 1966. The factory, the office, and the retail store were all located at 704 East Broadway.
How did the custom making of shoes come about?
In the women’s area, a lady came in and said ‘that’s a nice pink but I really want a brighter pink’ and then she picked up the yellow shoe and said ‘that’s a nice yellow but it really is too light’. My dad thought to himself, for crying out loud I can’t afford to carry 5 different colours of pink. So he said lady, ‘why don’t you get a piece of fabric, whatever colour pink you want, bring it back and I’ll make a shoe for you’. So it was almost the first day that they started charging extra to do a custom pair of shoes.
When did the company realize it was developing a following with skateboarders?
Santa Monica and Manhattan Beach is where they started coming in and custom making shoes. In the very beginning we sold tons of the #44 blue deck shoes. Then the custom orders started coming in, and it started with just red and blue. We let that run for a few months then we came up with a stock shoe - navy blue, gold, navy blue and then brown, beige, brown. We would watch the customs and make brown/ beige/ brown if everybody ordered it as a custom. You had school colours, team colours, skaters and bmx kids who came in the late 70’s and those guys really liked the wild colours. There was no leather around until 76/77 when we finally came up with the Old School which had leather in the toe and heel because skaters were wearing hell out of them. Leather would last a long time, longer than anything else. The outsole never wore out, the side wall of the material would never wear out, they could get it down to where there was just a little bit of fabric but the sides would still be good.
Where did the slip-on idea come from?
The company my dad worked for before made a slip on; he interpreted into our own style, number #48. It was actually a slip on with a non-skid sole for boating. Our 40th anniversary is coming up next year and we are going to be bringing back style #45 which has a blue top and a blue sole designed for gripping.
The checkerboard slip-on is probably the most recognised of all the Vans styles how did they come about?
In the late seventies I was now out of high school and I noticed kids were taking the side profile off the shoe, where the white rubber was, and colouring it in checkerboard. So the first thing we did was start making rubber with the checks on it and eventually we made some canvas. Right at the same we had a PR lady named Betty Mitchell and Universal Studio’s asked Betty for some shoes. So she sent a whole lot of checkerboard shoes for the movie Fast Times at Ridgemont High, we had no idea.
They liked them so much they ended up on the album cover and then Sean Penn, or Jeff Spicoli in the movie, was hitting him self over the head with the shoes in the movie. It was magic because we sold millions of checkerboards. My Dad didn’t really want to sell shoes outside of California and now he had no choice as people everywhere wanted our shoes!
What does the future hold for Vans?
We’re never going to have air pockets like Air Jordans and stuff like that, so we have to get creative with the materials. The thing that hasn’t come back totally yet are all the fun, crazy things we did with prints. That’s an area that still has a long run for us.
It seems hard to get support for a new idea unless its retro inspired. Is it hard to come out with something fresh and original in sneakers?
I know Grant who is our head designer, has a really great idea but I’d have to kill you if I told you. He’s got something that’s not that easy, that he’s been working on for a year and a half. If he comes through with it, it’s really going to be cool. There’s also a new line called Syndicate. We just showed it at ASR, it was on a corner parking lot under a big army tent. It’s got 4 or five different styles, the Half Cab is one, the Old School is one. There is tattoo art on an Authentic, it looks great. These are packaged really cool and it’s a special brand just for our best, core skate shops.
Just to finish off, what shoe would you pick to sum up what Vans is all about?
The Checkerboard Slip-on. People buy them to go do their weddings
(History of Vans)
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Vans: Geographic
Vans Warped tour is going on it's 15th year and is featuring more bands than ever! The tour also consists of a mix of extreme sports like surfing, skate boarding, snowboarding, BMX, motorcross and more. It is the ultimate symbol of Vans with the artists and athletes all wearing these awesome shoes, not to mention most of the fans too...(Tour Dates 2009)
View Larger Map
Monday, March 9, 2009
Vans: History
The vans company bagan with paul van doren, who had started manufacturing shoes over on the east coast in the 1960's. The idea then came to him to develop his own plant and sell his shoes directly to the public instead of retailers, thus making more of a profit.
Van Doren got together with partners Serge D'Elia and Gordy Lee, they took their business to california, where they opened their first retail store in Anaheim,in March of 1966. The company was know as Van Doren Rubber Company, but the shoes became known simply as Vans.
Opening retail stores started small, the first only offering 3 styles of vans, then grew so much over the next year that the company opened a new retail store almost every week. This retail created much of the companies early sucess. It also allowed then to hear public opinion of their shoes, and create a better product. For example, People complained over how easily the diamond pattern of the soles of the shoes cracked to easily aroung the ball of the foot.This led to the addition of vertical lines in the area and the design was then patented as Van's waffle sole.
In the 1970's the company got a huge boost from the growing skatebording craze. Skaters requested new colors and patterns, which led to the Era. The Era was a shoe designed by professional boarders. After this Vans became the skaters shoe of choice and established the companies long association with the sport. More color combinations and patterns were added from just the original red and blue and then in 1979 the Vans slip-on came to be, and was all the rage.
As the company expanded, ownership over the company was then split between not only Paul Van Doren and Serge D'Elia, but Gordy Lee and James Van Doren. Now each had an equal stake in the company. With his expanded share James decided to expand the company, and did with the help of the latest sports craze, BMX. Vans was now the official shoe of skaters and BMXers.
It wasn't until 1982 that Vans became nation wide. The shoes were featured in the film Fast Times at Ridgemont High, a movie in which the main character was wearing a pair of checker board slip-ons. This movie brought Vans into department stores and retailers all over. This boosted sales and the size of the company, which moved to a bigger factory in Orange, California.
In 1984 the company suffered some tough times, they were having to sell at low prices to deal with the imations coming in from asia,they were going through an investigation for apprently hiring illegal workers and the bottom dropped ot on the slip-on craze. The next months were hard and the company lost millions of dollars and gained alot of dept. The company eventually had the declare bankruptcy. After going trhough chapter 11, Paul Van Doren returned and lead to company out of bankruptcy by 1986.
The company was functioning well, but was a tiring business. Paul Van Doren arranged a leveraged buyout (worth $74.4 million)of the company to banking firm McCown De Leeuw & Co. Paul was placed as chair man with Gordy as vice chair man, and Richard Leewenburg as CEO of the newly renamed Vans Inc.
Vans Inc. continued to grow through the nineties despite numerous run ins with immigration problems. In 1993 Leewenburg was replaced with Walter Sochenfeld, who had pervious successes with his own company Brittania Sportswear, which he sold and then retired. Vans Inc. pulled him out of retirement to head Vans Inc. Schoenfeld helped Vans by moving some production overseas, and fixing minor problems that they were having. Schoenfeld then left in 1994, and was replaced Christopher G, Staff. He did a terrible job and was quickly removed, and Schoenfeld came back to help out Vans Inc. once again.
Schoenfeld made major changes in the company, by eliminating domestic production and switching the company from a company trying to sell what it produced to a company that produced what would sell. It was also here that Vans Inc. first started creating snowboarding boots, and put more interest into women's and children's shoes. All these changes helped revenue climb and put Vans on a steady path for the future(Vans,Inc).
Van Doren got together with partners Serge D'Elia and Gordy Lee, they took their business to california, where they opened their first retail store in Anaheim,in March of 1966. The company was know as Van Doren Rubber Company, but the shoes became known simply as Vans.
Opening retail stores started small, the first only offering 3 styles of vans, then grew so much over the next year that the company opened a new retail store almost every week. This retail created much of the companies early sucess. It also allowed then to hear public opinion of their shoes, and create a better product. For example, People complained over how easily the diamond pattern of the soles of the shoes cracked to easily aroung the ball of the foot.This led to the addition of vertical lines in the area and the design was then patented as Van's waffle sole.
In the 1970's the company got a huge boost from the growing skatebording craze. Skaters requested new colors and patterns, which led to the Era. The Era was a shoe designed by professional boarders. After this Vans became the skaters shoe of choice and established the companies long association with the sport. More color combinations and patterns were added from just the original red and blue and then in 1979 the Vans slip-on came to be, and was all the rage.
As the company expanded, ownership over the company was then split between not only Paul Van Doren and Serge D'Elia, but Gordy Lee and James Van Doren. Now each had an equal stake in the company. With his expanded share James decided to expand the company, and did with the help of the latest sports craze, BMX. Vans was now the official shoe of skaters and BMXers.
It wasn't until 1982 that Vans became nation wide. The shoes were featured in the film Fast Times at Ridgemont High, a movie in which the main character was wearing a pair of checker board slip-ons. This movie brought Vans into department stores and retailers all over. This boosted sales and the size of the company, which moved to a bigger factory in Orange, California.
In 1984 the company suffered some tough times, they were having to sell at low prices to deal with the imations coming in from asia,they were going through an investigation for apprently hiring illegal workers and the bottom dropped ot on the slip-on craze. The next months were hard and the company lost millions of dollars and gained alot of dept. The company eventually had the declare bankruptcy. After going trhough chapter 11, Paul Van Doren returned and lead to company out of bankruptcy by 1986.
The company was functioning well, but was a tiring business. Paul Van Doren arranged a leveraged buyout (worth $74.4 million)of the company to banking firm McCown De Leeuw & Co. Paul was placed as chair man with Gordy as vice chair man, and Richard Leewenburg as CEO of the newly renamed Vans Inc.
Vans Inc. continued to grow through the nineties despite numerous run ins with immigration problems. In 1993 Leewenburg was replaced with Walter Sochenfeld, who had pervious successes with his own company Brittania Sportswear, which he sold and then retired. Vans Inc. pulled him out of retirement to head Vans Inc. Schoenfeld helped Vans by moving some production overseas, and fixing minor problems that they were having. Schoenfeld then left in 1994, and was replaced Christopher G, Staff. He did a terrible job and was quickly removed, and Schoenfeld came back to help out Vans Inc. once again.
Schoenfeld made major changes in the company, by eliminating domestic production and switching the company from a company trying to sell what it produced to a company that produced what would sell. It was also here that Vans Inc. first started creating snowboarding boots, and put more interest into women's and children's shoes. All these changes helped revenue climb and put Vans on a steady path for the future(Vans,Inc).
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Vans: Sources
"The History of Vans Interview with Steve Van Doren." Skeaker Freaker Magazine. 15 Mar. 2009 http://www.sneakerfreaker.com/feature/history-of-vans/%20.
Bellis, Sarah. Personal interview. 1 Mar. 2009.
"Vans, Inc." Funding Universe. 15 Mar. 2009 http://www.fundinguniverse.com/%20.
"skater_girl1126's album." Photobucket. 15 Mar. 2009. 15 Mar. 2009 http://s17.photobucket.com/albums/b82/skater_girl1126/.
"Tour Dates 2009." Vans Warped Tour . 15 Mar. 2009.
Bellis, Sarah. Personal interview. 1 Mar. 2009.
"Vans, Inc." Funding Universe. 15 Mar. 2009 http://www.fundinguniverse.com/%20.
"skater_girl1126's album." Photobucket. 15 Mar. 2009. 15 Mar. 2009 http://s17.photobucket.com/albums/b82/skater_girl1126/.
"Tour Dates 2009." Vans Warped Tour . 15 Mar. 2009
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