We’re going to a wedding this weekend and I needed a new pair of shoes. On a recommendation from a friend I popped into my local Winners and grabbed a gorgeous pair of sandals on sale, as they’re clearing out the summertime merchandise. I was in and out in 10 minutes. Sweet!
It’s Winners’ practise to put huge, brightly coloured size stickers on the inside heels of their shoes. Helpful, right? Sure. But when you get those shoes home you realize that the sticky part of the sticker is made of some sort of industrial strength glue and it will take 3 men and a boy to remove it. Luckily I have a good supply of Goo Gone, a brilliant product for a situation such as this. Goo Gone dissolves anything sticky or smudgy and it made the job a breeze EXCEPT that part of the heel cover came off with the sticker. I was left with what looked like a small scar on each heel where the sticker had been. This would not do on brand new shoes.
Back to the store I went yesterday morning and showed the girl the damage. “Oh, those stickers are so tough” she said sympathetically. “When I buy shoes here I just leave those stickers on!” “But they’re neon pink and yellow and orange!” I replied. “You’d be able to see them when you walked.” She just shrugged but offered no opposition to my wish to exchange the shoes.
Naturally the same sandals in my size were all gone. I even looked at a half-size up or down and no dice. So I went with the pair I had determined were my second choice and made the exchange. (Bonus: I saved twenty bucks!) As the computer did its thing to complete the transaction, the same Winners girl took the anti-theft device off my new shoes and put it on the scarred ones. And what did she have in her drawer? A stack of those ridiculous stickers! Those shoes would be re-stuck with the offensive stickers and put back out for sale where, perhaps, someone who wasn’t as fussy about getting a perfect new pair of shoes would buy them.
After enduring my blow-dryer’s hot air for a few seconds each, the stickers on the second pair of sandals came up whole and a bit of Goo Gone removed the residue. It seems everyone is aware that the stickers are a problem. Why don’t they just affix size tags the way they do price tags, with little plastic doohickeys? It would save everyone a lot of unnecessary hassle, seems to me.