Finally ladies have some official fan gear that isn’t pink! NBA Licenses Custom-Made High Heels For Women The men of the NBA have never shied away from making fashion statements. There have been Daisy Duke-style shorts, shants (the baggy hybrid of shorts and pants), Pat Riley Armani suits, Air Jordans, Dennis Rodman tattoos, piercings, and hair dyes, and Allen Iverson sideways caps and corn rows. This season the Urkel-meets-Brooklyn-hipster costume is making headlines, best exemplified by the colorful wire framed glasses sans lenses worn by the Miami Heat’s Dwayne Wade and LeBron James, and the big boy fishy, teddy bear and umbrella-themed polo shirts worn by the Oklahoma City Thunder’s Russell Westbrook. But the latest trend the NBA is hoping to bank on is a new offering for its female fans: high heels. Yesterday the league announced its license agreement with Orlando-based shoe designer Herstar for a line of heels that includes two designs available for all 30 teams. One is a 6-inch crystal beaded version currently retailing for $275, the other a 4-inch microsuede version retailing for $99. Yes, 6-inch and 4-inch heels. The founder and CEO of Herstar, Holly Joffrion, can explain. Frustrated when nothing came of her online search for a pair of sport high heels to wear to an Orlando Magic game she was attending with her husband, the shoe designer had the vision of making her own team-themed pair. She worked on some prototype images with various teams’ logos and then last September the 25-year old posted a few on her website to gauge fan interest. Within three days, without any marketing or promotion, while the league was on the verge of its lockout, she found she was not the only one searching for such shoes. She had over 100 requests for her prototypes. Fortunately Joffrion already had her manufacturer and distributor lined up, as she had already been in the shoe business for five years. But the next hurdle was the NBA license agreement application. Without it she was unable to make or sell the shoes. So for three months she and her husband, who has a background in finance, hustled to get the paperwork done. By the time she presented her application to the NBA in February, Herstar’s back orders were in the hundreds, still without the company engaging in any marketing or advertising, outside of Facebook and Pinterest postings. It was more than enough to make up for the lack of 3-year sales figures the league requested on the merchandise. Additionally, by that point Joffrion had been so overwhelmed by requests for something higher than the 3-inch pair she had online, that she first added the 4-inch heels to the mix and later when asked for even higher, offered the 6-inch version. (For the record, Herstar will customize to lower lengths.) Yesterday after the NBA’s press release, Herstar’s sales jumped 400 percent on daily volume; traffic for the company’s website, where the shoes are primarily sold, jumped from a typical 4,000 daily hits to 35,000 hits. In total the company has sold enough pairs of heels to cover the initial $30,000 upfront license fee the NBA required and is already profitable. Current customers include the Orlando Magic’s Dwight Howard and Daniel Orton, while the top three sales markets are the San Antonio Spurs, Los Angeles Lakers and the Oklahoma City Thunder. This lady is about to get PAID! Vicky Picca, the NBA’s senior vice president of licensing and business affairs, said the league and more importantly its 25 million female NBA fans in the US couldn’t be happier. “Our female business has tripled over the last 5 years and what our fans were saying is that they no longer wanted a pink version of a male product,” said Picca. “This appeals to our savvy female consumer.” Ladies, would you rock a pair of these hoops heels? Peep the following pages to see some of Herstar’s designs. Images via Herstar
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For The Ladies: The NBA Has Licensed A Line Of “High-End” Stilettos For Those You That Want To Be A Fan AND Be Fly (At The Same Damn Time) [Pics]
