It was a dark and stormy night: fall in Portland, Oregon. Roger and I were riveted to (gasp) broadcast television! The Yankees were in the World Series. The Super Bowl, I watch for the ads. The World Series, I watch because I love baseball, especially when the Yankees are playing. Imagine my surprise when the ad below captured my attention. It won over refilling my Devil’s Lemonade and snack stock. (Here’s a link to the video on YouTube in case the one below doesn’t load.)
Do I want a butt like that? Hell, yeah.
Roger, who actually reads news, informed me that the shoes featured in this add are riding the MBT wave. I went forth and researched MBT. Could a shoe really give me a great butt? I’ve had a flat butt my entire life. Could these shoes be the answer to this non-maiden’s prayers?
My first stop was the MBT web site. I learned that MBT is not a shoe. It’s an anti-shoe. Whatevs, dudes, tell me why the shoe is special. And hey, can you make my butt look good?
I learned that MBT is an acronym for Masai Barefoot Technology. The shoes are designed to simulate walking in sand, like the Masai. The claim (backed with multiple boring studies in tiny print you can read for yourself) is that the MBT’s curved sole activates all of the muscles in your body in the act of walking and therefore helps not just sore feet, but also relieves pain and tension in the knees, back, neck, and assorted joints. Bonus: walking with MBT-shod feet burns more calories than with regular shoes.
Suddenly, I found myself curious about the shoes’ namesake. I read up on the Masai on Wikipedia, which reports that the Masai wear simple sandals with soles made from tire strips or plastic. They also seem to live inland in Kenya and Tanzania. I wonder if there’s a lot of sand there? The images with the Wikipedia article showed a lot of grass and dirt under their feet. Sand? Not so much. Oh, ick. Wikipedia says the Masai perform clitorectomies on their young women as a rite of passage.
Perhaps there is a different, coastal group of the Masai who walk on the sand with fabulous posture. At the very least, I reassure myself that not everything I read on Wikipedia is true. I suppose the marketing genius who came up with the company and product name sought to evoke images of lean, healthy Africans, running barefoot through the sunshine.
Next stop: Zappos. How much do these cost? Who are the competition? And how much do the competition’s shoes cost?
Cost: MBTs run between $119 for sale shoes and $265.
Competition: The big names are Reebok EasyTone, Sketchers Shape Ups and their sandal incarnation, Tone Ups.
The Sketchers are substantially less expensive, the price hovers around $120 for the shoes. The Reebok EasyTone shoes are even less expensive than that, about $100. I ruled the Reeboks out immediately because all their models look like athletic shoes, not shoes that I could wear to work.
Decision time: What should I buy? I headed for the mall to try on Sketchers and MBTs. I failed at my mission. Why? Because I tried on the MBTs first. Once they were on my feet, I decided that they could be pried off when I’m cold and dead.
It’s rare that I fall in love with a shoe as quickly as I did with my MBTs. I have a closet full of shoes that made my feet hurt after wearing them for a few hours. I’ve become skeptical of all shoes. I suspect they’re secretly out to pinch my pinky toe and crush my arch. But, the moment I put the MBTs on, I knew they wouldn’t do that. Either that, or I was suckered by the shoe sales guy and the stroll I took around the mall. There was no pain. No pull across the balls of my feet. No achey arches. I bought the shoes and wore them home.
Three months later, I remain unconvinced that there is merit in marketing claims from the MBT company. I don’t know if my butt looks any better. I’m in the depths of stuckitude with my weight, so if they’re burning more calories, it’s not showing on my scale. But the great news is: My feet don’t hurt! My hips hurt less! I forget at times that I’m even wearing shoes.
Hm. Maybe there’s something in their name after all.
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