Talk:Airwalk

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Airwalk article.
Please sign and date your posts by typing four tildes (~~~~). Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic. New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Ask questions, get answers. This is not a forum for general discussion about the article's subject.	Be polite Assume good faith No personal attacks Be welcoming	Article policies No original research Neutral point of view Verifiability

This article is within the scope of multiple WikiProjects. Click [show] for further details

Business and economics Portal This article is within the scope of the Business and Economics WikiProject. Start rated as start-Class on the assessment scale Mid rated as mid-importance on the assessment scale Fashion Portal This article is within the scope of the Fashion WikiProject. Please work to improve this article, or visit our project page to find other ways of helping. Thanks! Start This article has been rated as start-Class on the assessment scale. Mid This article is on a subject of mid-importance within fashion. Article Grading: The article has been rated for quality and/or importance but has no comments yet. If appropriate, please review the article and then leave comments here to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the article and what work it will need. This article is within the scope of WikiProject Sports. For more information, visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion. Sports and games Portal Start This article has been rated as Start-Class on the assessment scale. Mid This article is on a subject of mid priority for inclusion in Wikipedia 1.0. Sports To-do: edit  Here are some tasks you can do: Requests: Average (sports) (crucial article explaining the concept, nomenclature, math; redir to it from Average (sport); use Batting average as starting point for ideas) Cleanup: Sport governing body (this should-be-major article is in a shameful state) Field hockey (History section needs sources and accurate information - very vague at the moment.) Other: Assess: newly added and existing articles, maybe nominate some good B-class articles for GA; independently assess some as A-class, regardless of GA status. Split: Cross-training into Cross-training and Cross-training (business); Hockey puck into Puck (sports) (w/ Puck (sport) redir) and Hockey puck (and update Puck DAB page); Swimming into Swimming (general activity) and Swimming (sport) (eventually create subarticles for varieties) Categorize: Gather all (major/olympic) sports to be part of this project Photographs for pages listed in Wikipedia:Requested pictures/Society#Sport and referenced categories. This article is within the scope of WikiProject Skateboarding, a collaborative effort to create, expand, organize, and improve skateboarding-related articles to a feature-quality standard. If you wish to help, then please join!

[edit] Gladwell reference

The neutrality of Mr. Gladwell's assesment is most definately in question. All companies have good years and bad, and for the record all indications are that Airwalk is experiencing a period of growth. For a professional writer to term the Brand as 'doomed' or assert that Airwalk has 'found a place at the discount store level' is as biased as it is misleading. The truth is that Airwalk is sold at every level of stores from specialty sports wear to department stores worldwide. They have a current top quality website that looks to be vigorously maintained and a team of riders that are at the peak of their respective sports. Though I can appreciate the effort to sell ones book and promote oneself as a writer I would ask that Mr. Gladwell do it without assertation. Peridyn 20:09, 23 August 2006 (UTC)Bryon Taylor

I agree that the POV of this is pretty bad. It sounds like it was written by a disgruntled "look at me, I'm old school" skater kid. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.76.102.78 (talk) 14:09, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

New POV: I'll be happy to add to this that although some may think the POV of this sounds unbalanced, it's pretty right on. I can say this because I was an employee at Airwalk from almost the beginning and right up through the departure of Bill Mann and into the following regime. Why did things go wrong? Because George Yohn actually got involved in the company and led it away from what it did best, which was serve the action sports community and the lifestyle wannabes. Once George declared that he "didn't want to sell shoes to a bunch of purple-haired freaks with pierced noses"...in other words, the customers who had made him millions of dollars over the past few years...it was basically over (and that's a direct quote). The company fired or drove away all of it's original employees, hired on the aforementioned advertising agency Lambesis, and attempted to go mainstream. Although their initial orders into mainstream stores appeared to give them success, the lack of follow-up orders and sell through combined with misguided new designs "doomed" them. I don't think using the term "doomed" is misleading at all, being that the brand was eventually sold for next to nothing, died, and was resurrected as a Payless brand...not the real model of success that was synonymous with the early years of Airwalk under Bill Mann. So now they have a top quality website? That means they are a good company? I'll build you a website that will make your company look "top quality" anytime...it doesn't mean anything. It just means you have a few thousand dollars to spend on a website. I'm sure Mr. Gladwell wants to sell books, but I don't think he had much to do with the entry about Airwalk...he didn't need to. Thanks for letting me ramble. Jaimie Muehlhausen, former creative director Airwalk 1997-1993. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.176.156.145 (talk) 06:19, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

I want to help fix this page & remove the NPOV tag. The problem is that the criticism of the leadership reads as pure opinion. No references. Can you find an industry trade magazine article or source to back up this opinion? Mr Muehlhausen gives us reason to believe the view is accurate, but his testimony falls under the disallowed category of "original research". Can anyone salvage this section with a reference? If not, it really doesn't belong in the article. -- technopilgrim 01:33, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Jaime, A Payless brand? Come on. Is a brand owned or defined by what store it is sold in? That would make Vans a Sears Brand or Etnies a Kohl's brand then, right? If you looked deeper into where Airwalk is currently at, you would find not just a pretty website, but a competent pro team, Adverts in most major Action Sports Magazines, A grassroots following, Video, and more. So what makes a company then? I assume that Airwalks downfall came just after you left as creative director, right? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.15.63.237 (talk) 22:10, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

"Airwalk's rise and fall in popularity is a case study in The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference, a best-selling 2002 book by Malcolm Gladwell." This needs to be expanded or removed. futurebird 23:20, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

I think Mr. Gladwell's remarks are rather astute. Any unbiased observer would recognize that the Airwalk brand is now a mass marketed brand with razor-thin profit margins. Certainly, this was not the original aspiration of the company founders. To try to put the current situation in a positive light is really just polishing a turd. Does any shoe compamy start out wanting to be sold mainly at Payless Shoe Store? And buy the way, the web site is terrible. It looks cool, but try finding a specific type of Airwalk shoe. Even if you know the model name, it is still futile. A lot of bling, but no substance. It's really an annoying website to navigate through. I'm not a skater, and I am not even remotely connected to the shoe manufacturing industry. Personally, I like Birkentstock and Crocs. But I have no axe to grind. Some Airwalks are a great value, especially the clogs. David Linzer —Preceding unsigned comment added by Reznil (talk • contribs) 03:19, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

i liked the website. 66.97.212.8 15:30, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

it may indeed be a pov, but it is backed up with a source that made the statement so it can remain. i'm removing the dispute banner. Randella 04:03, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

Mr. Linzer, I do not believe your case is valid because Airwalk's profit margins are anything but 'razor thin', a statement which would need more definition as to what razor thin is as well, but that is beside the point. It's current standing perhaps was the initial objective of Airwalk as the brand is one which is focused on breing technical skate and lifestyle shoes to the masses with a quality to rival other Major similar brands at a fraction of the cost. Something Airwalk is doing incredibly well right now. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.15.63.237 (talk) 23:44, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Flubber

-oh by the way "the company decided to remove the flubber-like material from the soles which allowed users to actually walk on air." was actually in the article. someone put that in the article. Do you, the readers, know what "flubber" is? it's a movie. So if you can elaborate, on how exactly this substance is comparable to "flubber", then i would be most interested. (you see I, like everyone else in the world, have NO IDEA what you mean. i havent seen the material they used to buy for their product, and i can hardly imagine anybody 'walking on air'.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.97.212.8 (talk) 15:37, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Informative website

If anyone feels up to expanding this article (which I may tend to myself if I find the time), this website provides some useful information. There should at least be some mention of Items International, and I can get additional information on its business and operational ends (as opposed to its cultural impacts). --Bossi (talk • gallery • contrib) 04:44, 21 December 2007 (UTC)