School shoes... Are Clarks crap?

[MayDayChild]

I'm waiting a few more months to buy PFB her first boring black school shoes.
BUT
I have read a few reviews that Clarks are crap.
Can anyone clarify? Are they crap as in they are the same quality as say Next or even George shoes but thrice as expensive ? Or not worth their money?

What are good shoes? Startrite, lelli Kelly or the other Euro brands like Ecco or Geox.
If I'm gonna spend £32 in Clarks then might I be better spending £40 on something else?
She has flat skinny feet so I've only ever really bought Clarks before.

I have 3 children and got tired of changing their shoes every month. Until I found this website that sells PABLOSKY shoes at the most competitive price that I have come across. I have not looked back since and they have a very nice selection of lovely shoes. I have already gotten my children school shoes from there to beat the rush. www.eeruka.com. All the best

I buy Clarks shoes from John Lewis. The staff there are the usual JL excellent breed and I like Clarks shoes so best of both worlds. DS has never outworn a pair of Clarks shoes before they were outgrown. I suppose it depends on the age of the children we are talking about - with older children it is not unreasonable to expect a pair of school shoes to last an entire academic year, as long as they still fit. DS needs new shoes every 3 months or so at the moment.

Whenever my kids had clarkes shoes, the buckles fell off, or the stupid little flower came off, or they scuffed really badly. I like start rite best, all the start rites have lasted for both girls whereas I never handed down a pair of clarkes.

Ricosta are brill (though note they have narrow/medium/wide fitting system, and can be hard to find other than medium on line), and I love Geox on ds. His start rite school shoes have done pretty well
I loathe Clarks as they never fit ds, and the staff always try and persuade you that a shoe that patently doesn't fit is ok.

Over the years I have found that clarks boys school shoes are excellent and wear well, but girls shoes not as well. For dd I always buy start-rite as they really good for girls but no so good for boys.

I've found Clarks to be generally OK, except the ones with the toy in the heel. I've also had some good pairs from TK Maxx which have lasted just as long. One of the brands was Norvik as mrz mentioned - they were fine!

After my dd having a pair of leather shoes from Clarkes which looked terrible and scuffed within a week, I will now only buy patent leather shoes from there which usually last longer and clean up nicely with a baby wipe. Staff are awful though, measured her feet as 10.5 but then bring out all sorts of shoes you don't want in a size 11.

Clarks are better than cheap brands, but sometimes not as much better as you would like. DD's present patent and leather shoes have lasted pretty well and are a reasonably supportive style. A couple of years ago her whole class seemed to have the same more pump like ones and they were dreadful ( no ones looked smart, even those of the polish every morning kind of mums).
Trouble is that you rarely get much choice and the whole process is stressful. Very stressful if you are taking my teenage DD1, who wants comfortable shoes, not slip-ons that have to be just fashionable enough not to get her teased. I would like to make it a rule that teasing any child for their choice of school uniform should be a hanging offence, but that's a whole new thread.

Shoes with the toys, remove toy Evo stick down the insole. Otherwise they get nasty folds. DD learnt the hard way and now just gives them to Dad herself.

I've always bought ds's school shoes from clarkes, but then I'm not fussy about how clean/scuffed they get. They have always lasted the year although by now they've usually grown out of them.

Just bought my ds1 his first pair of DM's for secondary school

Ricosta or Hush Puppies from our local independent shoe shop

I buy only Clarkes or Start-rite for my DCs, and wouldn't really consider anything else. So far they have all been great quality and last until grown out of. They do need to be properly fitted IMO, and if you buy the tat places like Next sells, they won't be. For this reason, despite being tempted, I would never buy shoes online for the children from eg Boden, where I buy a lot of their clothes.