In the past, I have always bought what I judged to be the best-fitting and highest-performance running shoes. I was always successful, although I was always disappointed when my favourite shoes had to be buried in the ground for the simple reason that less than 5% of the shoe was worn out – the outsole’s tread layer.

Sometimes, this would happen in as little as 6 months, and only rarely would they last more than a year. Often, the shoes would become unusable because the many small patches of tread would start to fall off and disappear, and the shoes couldn’t be repaired.

I got more serious early this decade about reducing the amount of ultra-durable rubbish that I produce, and now think much more carefully about quality and repairability before making any purchase. For example, for running shoes, instead of buying the usual running shoe with many small sections of tread that wear out or fall off, I made sure to buy running shoes with a single one-piece tread layer on each shoe (I bought “Adidas Ultraboost”, and found that “New Balance Fresh Foam Roav Knit” was another option, and there are probably others).

Can you Repair Running Shoes?

The answer is yes, you can. When it wore out (a couple of months after the below photos), I was able to have it replaced for $20 per shoe or something at Mister Minit in December 2019. I have since had these shoes re-soled again, about 6 months ago (today is 20 June 2021).

This article was written by Greg Hunt as a way to teach people how to repair running shoes and encourage repairing over throwing away, according to the circular economy principles. There is often a solution to keep goods out of landfill if people are creative and able to think outside the box…

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