.. to find school shoes just unbelievably expensive?!

[joster]

Decent shoes are important, sure, but almost 40 pounds a pair for fairly "standard" Start Rite shoes for my son and daughter...?? How is that?! Can someone justify it on behalf of the shoe manufacturers?! Husband groaned as he walked through the door and saw the two boxes on the hall stand and I don't blame him, I got the jitters putting in my PIN number at the shop!

yes, very expensive but very preferably to cheap asda shoes for the health of your children's feet. They surely don't cost much more to produce, it is annoying they are so much more expensive.

*preferable

i agree, 2 children £72 later they each had ew shoes. Thank your lucky stars tho there was triplets in there when we were there, poor parents!

Wish the shoes would last though - just a few times down the slides & the back of the heels will be worn out.

I hate buying shoes, dd2 wrecked dr martens in 6 weeks imagine how long clarks last! £40 a month just about on school shoes!

I also don't buy shoes with a big heel or shoes with Velcro so it's not an easy task finding them either

I bought dd a £9.99 pair of school shoes from Diechmann.

They change into plimsolls inside school, and it won't be long before the needs a proper pair of winter boots.

It would be absolute madness to buy expensive shoes.

Just spent £115 on three pairs - gulp. I'm actually not convinced that my start-rited children have any better foot health than non-expensively shod children, but I can't manage to translate that into buying cheaper shoes.

I recommend Sports.com. Its a real shop despite the internet sounding name. Often in a big retail park. Lots of name brand shoes v.cheap. They tend to stock stuff like Londsdale and Airwalk. These are perfectly fine brands but not up there with the Nikes and Addias so are much cheaper.

Got DS1's shoes today. I bought him leather lace ups, leather trainers and a pair of low top sneakers for less than £50. Pretty good considering he is a size 11-12 (I mean big man size).

Its a bit like a sports wear jumble sale but I am willing to brave it if it saves me a few hundred quid.

I often get shoes from Priceless and the like. I just make sure I get the leather ones. Never had a problem with them and they last as long as the Clarks ones I have got before.

I bought my dc's school shoes from M&S last term, much less expensive than clarkes. However they all needed replacing very quickly, so no saving really.

foothealth I don't buy clarks for the brand, more the fitting. I can't see there's any point paying for other branded shoes as they are effectively the same as other cheaper brands.

This is the reason I buy clarks. Clarks are fitted by trained members of staff and come in length and width sizes increasing the likelihood of a good fit. Obviously you can get a good fit from cheaper shoes bought elsewhere but it is less likely mostly because of the width fitting aspect. My DS has very wide feet (H fitting) and my dd has very thin feet (D fitting) so it is difficult to find good shoes that fit well.

You should always buy new shoes too as used shoes will have become shaped to another person's feet.

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God I sound like I work for them! lol

Thety are so expensive partly because they come in so many sizes and widths that the production runs are much shorter and therefore the unit cost higher
A friend of mine has a DD with drastically different sized feet and has to buy 2 pairs every time !

I got ds measured in clarks then took him to Deichmann and spent £20 on leather shoes.

Clarks/start rite a complete rip off.

Clarks measurements are only a guide, it's the fitting that matters. A clarks measurement might not translate at all to another brand of shoe so whilst it is logic of some form to use the measuring service in clarks, it's not very reliable really.

i used to think they were expensive but my DD's last pair of clarks lasted her a full year! she didnt grow out of them and they didnt wear out - so it was £35 quid well spent!

plus this year we are having a battle of wills - she wants trendy dolly shoes but she has really narrow feet (she is 12 now and fashion concious)

so ive let her have her pick but from clarks. theyve done some nice trendy styles this year but still in varying width fittings. for £32 im happy - they are leather, they fit her, and they are trendy enough for her to wear without cringing!

DS went through 5 (I think!) pairs of shoes last school year. He literally wore holes in each pair. I am fairly good (19 times out of 20) about making him change out of them when he gets home before he plays out, so I was a bit about this. One pair literally lasted 4 days. I took them back each time (all Startrites from Jones the Bootmaker), and got a free replacement each time. He didn't change size all school year.

Luckily, he has now grown over the summer. Just spent another small fortune on DS1 & 2 today. Fingers crossed these fare better!!!

DS1 is about to start secondary.

I have to find a plain pair of black shoes with plain black laces, plain black stitching, and plain black soles....easy yes? No because they are NOT allowed :
boots
slips on
shoes that look like trainers
crepe (?) soles
dr marten style soles
Kickers
any shoe with a tag on
or a logo

I also have to find decent white soled training shoes for indoors
and decent black soled training shoes for outdoors.

So far the cheapest pair of shoes I have found are £49.99 but he is only 11 and so i don't think this is practical.

I find it baffling that i spend more on the DCs shoes than I do myself. I am not convinced they are any better but the guilt gets me everytime.

I have no faith in clarks after my newphew was fitted with his first pair of proper walking shoes in there...sis got them home to find they had left the tissue paper in the front of them and once removed they were obviously too big...training anyone?

Clarks Bootlegs for girls have labels on them this year. On the outside. Which is great for dd2 who isn't allowed shoes with labels on outside, so i can't insist on Clarks. Even if they had her size which they never do.

TheLadyEvenstar I got some black-soled trainers in Sports Direct in Milton Keynes today for £9.99 in sale. Leather.
There seemed to be white-soled ones as well.

I won't direct you to the website as there are about 5 billion trainers to wade through but if there's a branch near you it may be worth a look.

poorbuthappy - yes, that's shocking! Our clarks are generally good at fitting. The shop assistants used to fit me for my shoes so I know they've got lots of experience! I had a rubbish weekend girl once though.

I thought exactly the same thing today - £40 really is a lot for a pair of school shoes and I have no choice but to pay up

I am sure they are even more expensive than they were at Easter - the last time I bought school shoes.

My dd1 (who never pays more than a fiver for shoes and it shows) went to school in new shoes, and came home moaning. The cardboard shape thing was still in them.