The Walking Support Insole Market: Moving Toward Walking Support

This chapter and the next analyze the unintended impact of the success of JIF’s activities on the insole market. The heightened interest in foot health, triggered by the spread of shoe fitters, led to behavioral changes among insole manufacturers, who were beyond JIF’s initial target of shoe retailers, and consumers. Due to their chain of actions, the insole market shifted in a direction consistent with JIF’s superordinate goal—foot health—in the late 1990s, and the market gradually changed its path and became oriented toward a direction—fashion—that was inconsistent with JIF’s superordinate goal in the 2000s. This chapter deals with the period from the establishment of the insole market in the 1970s in Japan to the establishment and growth of the walking support insole category in the late 1990s. As the hygienic insole market peaked in the 1990s, insole manufactures launched walking support insoles for women as alternatives to hygienic insoles for men and the walking support insole category was established. Behind the success of walking support insoles among women was the heightened awareness of foot health, which was triggered by JIF and shoe fitters. This, in turn, boosted the establishment and growth of the overall walking support insole market category.