Taking a look at Tom’s website traffic overtime - the web traffic has been very steady.
They have a lot of branded search volume on google
They have a strong brand compared with competitors
Top paid terms are mostly their branded terms
Their ads on google helps illustrate what the main value prop is to customers
- Comfort
- Style
- “Shoes that feel & look good”
They sell more than just shoes although shoes most likely makes up a large piece of the business as it’s what they are known for
They are not a publicly traded company currently
Company information
Its one for one donation model made buying one of it's iconic canvas shoes an act of charity. And for a while, that really worked. By 2013, TOMS was reportedly making 250 million dollars in sales a year and had donated 10 million pairs of shoes since it's launch. Just one year later, the company was valued at 625 million dollars. (source)
The company got it’s start with an Argentine shoe and having Hollywood celebrities wearing it which influenced the broader market to get one
Narrator: TOMS slip on canvas shoes, became synonymous with the brand turning into what marketing pros call a hero product.
Russ Winer: A hero product is a product that is the archetypal brand, all right, for a company, the one that's the most successful that people think of when you think of the company. So, for example, like Nike, it could be Air Jordans, for Porsche, it might be the 911.
Narrator: It's like how when you see Hermes, you think of the Birkin bag or associate Heinz with Ketchup. For TOMS, it was the original shoe, based on the Alpargata. Paired with its charitable giving model, TOMS seemed unstoppable. TOMs history
Other players in footwear
Birkeinstock & Sketchers
Amazon Analysis
Doing a quick search for ASINs associated with the brand TOMS there are 84,000+ results. This is most likely because you need SKUs for lots of possible size options for footwear.
The sandals for women appear to be crushing it
For Amazon TOMS doesn’t control the buy box and there are a lot of 3rd party resellers on the platform
This platform sandal has a higher price than the slip on shoes so I imagine it’s more profitable for the company and sells better during the summer months. It was launched in April 2023 so about a year ago. Looking at the BSR we can see it spiked up in the winter months most likely because there are fewer sales during that time for the shoe. I also imagine that in general women buy more pairs of shoes than men so the female shoe market I would expect to be bigger than the male part of the business.
Ways to organize products - for the product catalog organizing products with these dimensions would be important. Performance by:
- Male / Female / Neutral
- Item Type: Shoe, Slip On, Sandal, Platform, Etc.
- Style
- Color / Pattern
- Size - shoes have many sizes
- Potentially the material type for the feel
- Not sure if I missed anything here
