Tomorrow’s Shoes

Blake did.

Blake was a classic entrepreneur who when he saw a need often tried to solve it. He’d already started a campus dry cleaning service at university and was working an online driver’s ed program for teenagers. Well Blake was on vacation in Argentina and got completely immersed in their culture. He learned about the tango, polo, Malbec and got used to wearing the national shoe, “the alpargata”. He found people wearing theses shoes wherever he went. One day he met a woman volunteering in a shoe drive who told him many kids and families in Argentina just couldn’t afford shoes .. even the alpargatas. So Blake thought about setting up a shoe donation service but realized that the supply wouldn’t be constant. Then it hit him, sell a pair of shoes today and give a pair tomorrow. And what better shoe to sell but “alpargata”. So he headed home to the US with a duffel bag of the simple shoe which he sold out … and then went back for more … Blake ended up selling 10,000 shoes that first year … and donating another 10,000 in Argentina.

Today, just over ten years later, Blake’s shoe company has donated over 60 million pairs of shoes to those in need around the world. A shoe company originally named "Shoes for a Better Tomorrow," which eventually became "Tomorrow's Shoes," then just TOMS.

TOMS is a great idea because combining two ideas together to fulfil a need can lead to something that might fit just right.