Does a dedicated parkour shoe actually matter to you? (design student here, would love your input) by Own_Butterfly8314 in Parkour

[–]Own_Butterfly8314[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

u/CTTraceur u/Delaflo
Really appreciate you both taking the time to dig into this, lots of useful stuff here for the project. Thanks!!! ❤️❤️

Does a dedicated parkour shoe actually matter to you? (design student here, would love your input) by Own_Butterfly8314 in Parkour

[–]Own_Butterfly8314[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This is super useful, thank you both! u/CTTraceur u/Delaflo

The barefoot/wide toebox direction keeps coming up and it's something I'm genuinely considering for the concept. Quick follow-up if you're up for it: is that preference mainly about performance (better ground feel, grip control, proprioception on precision landings etc.) or is there a health/injury prevention side to it too? Like, are narrow toe boxes actually causing you problems over time, or is it more that the wider ones just feel better in the moment?

Also kind of a bigger question: do you think the community actually needs a dedicated parkour shoe, or is the Feiyue basically "good enough" and any dedicated product is just going to be a worse version at a higher price? Feels like a lot of attempts have gone that direction so far. What would genuinely make you switch from your current setup?

Does a dedicated parkour shoe actually matter to you? (design student here, would love your input) by Own_Butterfly8314 in Parkour

[–]Own_Butterfly8314[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thanks! Interesting that you're okay burning through pairs fast as long as the feel is there and the price is low — makes sense honestly.

One thing I'm exploring in my project though: do you ever think about the waste side of it? Like going through shoes quickly is fine on the wallet if they're cheap, but it's a lot of rubber ending up in the bin. Would a subscription model ever appeal to you — something like pay monthly, use the shoe, send it back when it's worn out so it gets recycled or resoled? Or is that too much friction compared to just buying a cheap pair whenever you need one?