Disposable Soles - Occupying that niche that nobody wants...

Many products succeed by discovering a niche where there's a demand but no product satisfying it; then there are those that fail by inventing a niche where there's no demand but trying to cram a product into it anyway. This seems like the latter: disposable soles, by designer Jun-Soo Choi on Yanko Design (and via Gizmodo). It seems like these deftly dodge any kind of advantage you might try to pin on them - they ruin the clean, free feeling of being barefoot by plastering some adhesive to your sole. They don't provide the comfort and coziness of slippers. They're pretty wasteful, which is sure to offend the environmentalist set that probably overlaps significantly with the barefoot demographic. Am I missing anything...?

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I can think of one place these would be useful -- nail salons. If you don't bring along open-toed shoes when you get a pedicure, they give you awful disposable sandals to walk out with. But I doubt these feel any more comfortable, walking around on asphalt.

Dave Gustafson said...

You're right, they'd be appropriate in that situation, but not really any more so than the disposable sandals you mention. And they'd STICK to your feet, which I imagine would just feel... blech!

Anonymous said...

At open houses - either I have to take my shoes off or wear some grotty blue things that slip over the shoes.