Ugliest Shoes Ever

**dgaddis** · 06-06-2018

Was telling this story to a coworker and though vSalon would enjoy it.

The year - 2002. Or 2003. Somwhere in there. I was in high school and had a job at Finish Line selling shoes.

I knew nothing about shoes, and didn't care about shoes one bit. First time I ever heard of Labron James was when a little kid stopped by our store and asked me when his new shoe was coming out - I was like "who?" (we sold out of every pair except a size 15 before lunch the day they came out, FYI)

Anyhow. While I was working there Nike came out with the first version of the Kukini. It was, I'll argue, the ugliest shoe of all time.

The sole was mostly a soft foam like material (blue in the pic below), with a little rubber (black) for traction. The upper had a thin inner lining and a mesh exterior and it used velcro straps instead of laces.

They were super light weight, and super comfortable. But horribly ugly. Also, the soles had holes in them. I was told (and this could have been incorrect) that they were designed for triathletes, and the holes were so when they got out of the water and started their run water could drain out and their feet would dry out quickly.

At the time I didn't know anything about triathlons, so I didn't realized the order of events was swim->bike->run and this explanation didn't make any damn sense, but whatever.

The holes were also great at letting water into the shoe if you stepped in a puddle.

No one wanted these shoes. They were, at the time, ugly as sin. Funny enough, now, after seeing things like those 5-finger shoes, they don't look so bad.

Anyhow. Nike had a sales contest in the metro Atlanta area, the winner would get two tickets to a Matchbox 20 concert. I sold three pair of the shoes and won the contest! Somehow they sent the tickets to the wrong store or something, so I didn't get to go to the concert. So isntead they gave me a pair of the Kukinis (in the blue/white color pictured), a pair of Shox, and a nice heart rate monitor/watch (that I still have!). After the contest Nike bought them back from the stores so they could put something else on the shelves that would actually sell. Our store only ever sold four pair.

I ended up keeping the Kukini's for several years, and used them every summer when I went trout fishing. They had way better traction than the typical 'water shoes' you'd find at Wal-Mart and they dried out way faster than normal sneakers. I only went trout fishing once or twice a year, so I never invested in any "real" gear.

Pic from here :: Nike Experiments in Minimalism

**sk_tle** · 06-06-2018

It should be hard to beat these two :

I'm surprised there is no gravel mode on the dials. Actually not that surprised as these must be a nightmare off the roads with all kind of things sticking in the spaces.

**David Tollefson** · 06-06-2018

Nikes from the 80's... Definitely a run for the money on ugliest shoes ever.

Those holes are indeed to let water out. Like the water that a triathlete would dump over their head on a lava-field-like marathon in Hawaii. Never had any use for such things myself.