On the other hand, a bad logo can leave a brand open to ridicule, and in some cases can even lead to stores refusing to carry their shoes. Such was the case with the brand Gravity Defyer. A few years ago I would often see web ads for Gravity Defyer shoes, and had to chuckle at the fact that they had what appeared to be a sperm logo on the sides:

I suspect that wearing a shoe with a sperm on the side is an effective form of contraception.

The shoes feature springs in the heel, as well as trampolines and stabilizers, and were often featured in the Skymall Catalogue (Skymall was a retailer whose catalogue was found in seat pockets of airplanes in the US – they are now out of business). You might think that the logo was intended to represent something else (maybe a tadpole?), but according to this article on Business Insider, the choice of a sperm logo was indeed intentional:

"Our logo is deliberate. Our customers feel like they are getting the beginning of a new life when they try our shoes," said Alexander Elnekaveh, CEO of Gravity Defyer. "We are not embarrassed by it."

Well, apparently times have changed, and not even the addition of multiple sperm was enough to prevent an inevitable logo change:

Nothing inspires speed like a race to conceive new life! And I wonder if there is any relation between the 3-sperm logo and the fact that this was “Revision 3.69”?

I’m not sure exactly when it happened, but Gravity Defyer now has a new logo, and sperm are no longer splashed on the sides of their shoes:

My initial reaction is that the logo looks a bit like the Om symbol – maybe they’re going after the yoga crowd?:

It’s definitely an improvement, though the bar was set pretty low by whoever decided to put reproductive cells on the earlier shoes.

Let this be a lesson to all marketers and shoe designers – though a great shoe may make you feel newly alive, celebrating that feeling with sperm is never a good idea.

Sales of all running shoes (road, race and trail) reached $53M in June, 15% above June 2011. Road running shoes, with $50M, also gained 15%. All three running shoe categories (motion control, stability and neutral/cushion) posted dollar growth this month. Stability shoes jumped 12%, neutral cushion another 21%. Even motion control shoes eked out a 1% gain, the second straight month of increased sales for the category. Although all three categories were up, Neutral/cushion shoes increased their pace in the race to the top, just barely outselling stability shoes for the third straight month. Still, the top five best selling shoes this month were all stability models (Brooks Adrenaline men’s and women’s, Asics 2170 men’s and women’s and Saucony Progrid Guide 5, women’s)

Trail runners were ahead of June 2011 by 8%; year-to-date sales were 15% above the same period in 2011.

Minimalist shoes outpaced traditional models at retail for yet again. All minimalist running shoes pulled in $6M, up 41% from June 2011. So far this year, minimalist accounted for $31M in dollar sales.

The gist is that running shoe sales were all around strong, with neutral cushion shoes (21%) and minimalist shoes (41%) posting the biggest increases in sales over numbers from June 2011. I’m not sure how they define minimalist shoes as a category, but these numbers would indicate that they are about 10% of the specialty running market. Interesting that despite the continued strong performance of the “neutral cushioned” category, the top five selling shoes are all stability shoes (though I must admit that I have put about 50 miles on the Saucony Guide 5 and it’s a pretty solid shoe at 8mm drop!).

To read the full report, visit Leisure Trends Group.