If you’re a safety footwear distributor, you’ll want to stock footwear that gives your female customers protection and comfort. Simple. Well, it should be, but unfortunately, the market is full of footwear which might look and sound like it’s designed for women, but actually offers very little in the way of specific comfort and protection.
In this blog, we’ll show you what to avoid and what to look for when deciding on your female safety footwear range, so you can ensure you’re offering your customers compliant and fit for purpose female work boots that protect feet – and your reputation.
WHAT TO AVOID
‘Pink it and shrink it’
This type of footwear is marketed as ‘female-fit,’ but in reality there is very little in the design to reflect this. Boots and shoes in this category are simply men's footwear, built on a men’s last (the wooden or plastic form around which the footwear is shaped), but with the aesthetics changed to give the impression they are designed for women. Often this can involve using a smaller size and giving them a more typically ‘feminine’ look, hence the ‘pink it and shrink it’ name.
This type of footwear causes the same issues that men’s footwear creates when being worn on a women’s foot, because essentially these two footwear types are one and the same thing: not built for the job.
Nominal
This footwear type is perhaps slightly better than the "pink it and shrink it" approach, because it is technically made with female wearers in mind as it uses a last for women. However, the problem lies in the fact that the last is created with good intentions rather than any extensive knowledge or expertise.
Many believe that women simply have narrower feet compared to men, so this footwear is often made with a last that is sanded down to reduce the width. While this approach may offer a slight improvement in terms of suitability for female wearers, it fails to consider all of the nuanced anatomical characteristics of the female foot. As a result, it falls short in providing adequate foot health, safety, and comfort.
Another issue with nominal footwear is that a significant portion of the world's footwear is manufactured in China, where the native population has narrower feet compared to the wider European foot shape. Therefore, if a last is sanded down under the assumption that it will create a "female fit," it may end up being too narrow for European females who have typically wider feet.
Also, the female foot differs from men's in ways other than width.
Women’s feet also have:
- A smaller Achilles tendon
- Higher arches
- A shallower big toe
- A lower instep
- A more curved inside line
Women and men even walk differently. Women take shorter strides, and they also tend to pronate their feet - which is when the individual rolls their feet inwards.
Women’s FIT IN football ⚽
The issue of women having to suffer due to wearing men’s scaled-down footwear isn’t confined to the world of safety or apparel – it has become an international debate since several injuries to female footballers have been attributed to the lack of football kit designed for women.
In the journal ‘Sports Engineering,’ a group of sports and exercise researchers, doctors and members of the professional women's game including Leah Williamson, the England captain, voiced the need for more kit and equipment to be tailored to the body shape of women in football. When discussing footwear, the journal outlined:
“Proper fit is an important feature related to comfort of footwear but also injury risk, fatigue, mobility, performance, and alignment of the lower limb.”
Want to read more? Head to the full report via the article here.
Knowledge is power
The unfortunate reality is that there are a lot of misleading 'women’s fit' safety footwear products on the market. And they can cause foot health issues ranging from distraction from discomfort, blisters, corns and calluses right the way up to long-term well-being issues such as joint misalignment and a decrease in morale, performance and productivity at work.
But for a distributor, it’s an easy trap to fall into, because it’s not always obvious when offering a footwear range for women which products are nominal, 'pink it/shrink' boots or something genuinely designed for a female wearer. But, if you’re selling safety footwear, it’s crucial you get to know.
So what female footwear are you selling – and is it the right kind for your customers and reputation?
The problem
If you’re a safety distributor, you’ll know there are some things that are essential to have in order to acquire and then maintain loyal customers. And when it comes to selling PPE, one of the most important ones is trust.
If you sell any PPE, to keep people safe and maintain your reputation, it has to perform.
It’s human nature to look for comfort and avoid pain, so if the boots you’ve sold to customers are ‘off the shelf’ or poorly designed, wearers will do two things quickly: be uncomfortable, and then find a more comfortable alternative.
Ultimately, what you promote is more than just safety products – it’s your reputation. And while PPE can be replaced, a reputation that’s damaged in the safety industry is far harder to restore - because selling products that mislead the wearer can destroy trust in your brand. But – the right fit for you and your customers is out there.
WHAT TO LOOK FOR
True women’s fitTM
True women’s fit occurs when footwear is made for women by using a last that reflects the specific anatomical shapes and structures of the female foot. As a result, when worn, it supports and contours the feet of women.
V12 Footwear’s entire women’s safety range is built on just this type of last. And the proof is plain to see.
Look at the images below.
The V12 women’s last (in blue) appears very different from the nominal last (in green) because it reflects the differences in shape and structure of the whole female foot. Note how the V12 last is much more contoured and specifically shaped, compared to the relatively generic and shapeless nominal last.
Finally, notice how the V12 last is split.
This means the footwear is moulded tightly to the last, but doesn’t change or become misshapen when removed, as the split means the last can be extracted in stages.
Above and beyond
Because comfort and foot health are so important to us, we took things even further. When we created our last for both our true women's and men’s fit range, we used over 4,000 foot scans of global foot shapes, so our footwear reflects both the narrower feet of Eastern nations such as China as well as the wider European fit.
This means when you stock V12 footwear, whether it’s for female or male wearers, you know that it has been designed from the start to support and contour the specific foot shape that the wearers’ gender determines, whilst also encompassing global foot shapes to give it higher levels of comfort through a universal fit. (find out more here)
If you want to showcase your company as an industry leader that female work boot wearers can trust with their comfort and safety, get in touch via the button below. True Women’s FitTM footwear is just a click away.
