Will ds end up crippled if I don't buy his shoes from Clarks?

[LiegeAndLief]

Ds is 17 months old and just gone up a shoe size (measured by Clarks). Blanching at the thought of shelling out another £30 on shoes for him, I went to Next, tried on lots of shoes (no width fitting so several were too narrow) and bought a pair which seemed a good fit and ds walked in fine. Although I am no trained shoe fitter.

Anyway, this morning was attacked by a fit of guilt walking past Clarks and ended up going and buying him another pair. Have compared them to the Next shoes and really can't see any difference in terms of fit, size, flexibility etc... am I missing something?

BTW am not meaning to start a thread comparing Clarks, Startrite etc as the only "proper" children's shoes available near us are Clarks.

Well a child needs shoes..what can you do..especially when they little there feet grow so fast..coats is my thing always needing coats..my 4yr old come out of school last with a rip in his coat so thats another coat got to be bought...

I can't see what difference it makes tbh, checking the fit of shoes is just common sense really, it's not like the people in clarkes have degrees in it. They only ever seem to have manky shoes in dd's size, either patent leather or pink, which last roughly 3 seconds.