Page 12 - aruba-today-20230303

A12 business
Friday 3 March 2023
Shoe polish stands begin to vanish,

lose their shine

By MAE ANDERSON and
TED SHAFFREY
The Associated Press
NEW YORK (AP) — On a
recent winter weekday at
Penn Station Shoe Repair
and Shoe Shine, men hop
onto shoeshine chairs and
pull out newspapers and
phones to read while shoe-
shiners get to work applying
polish and elbow grease to
loafers, boots and other
leather shoes. When fin-
ished, these customers
hand over $8 in cash at a Customer Ray Ozoria gets a shoeshine from Bertha Gomez at
counter where a sign reads the Alpha Shoe Repair Corp., Friday, Feb. 3, 2023, in New York.
"We're not God, but we do Associated Press
save soles."
Shoeshining has a vaunt- repair market has declined he would take the train
ed history in the U.S. In the an estimated 23% between with his father on his way
1860s, Horatio Alger popu- 2013 and 2023 to $307 mil- to work one Friday each
larized the "rags-to-riches" lion, according to market month and watch him get
American narrative with his research firm IBISWorld. a shoeshine.
book "Ragged Dick" about Shoe polish sales in 2022 "I would just sit here as a
a shoeshiner (or "boot- totaled 27.3 million units, a little guy, you know, ob-
black") who works his way down 29% compared with serving," he said. "And here
up to wealth. "Shoeshine 2019, according to figures I am, you know, 30 years
boys" (and occasional girls) from Nielsen, a sign of the later, doing the same thing.
have subsequently been changes brought on by the So, it's certainly something
in countless movies and pandemic. that's passed down over
TV shows. Today, the tradi- Nisan Khaimov, who owns time."
tion of getting a quick pol- the Penn Station stand, Across town, in the corri-
ish from a rag-toting shoe- said his stand would shine dor between the subway
shiner is greatly diminished, 80 to 100 shoes each work- and The Port Authority bus
and many stands similar day before the pandemic. terminal, Jairo Cardenas is
to the one in Penn Station Now it's between 30 to 50 also feeling the pinch. Busi-
have disappeared across on Tuesday to Thursday, ness at Alpha Shoes Repair
the country. The decline and even fewer on Mon- Corp., which he's run for 33
has been exacerbated days and Fridays. Hybrid years, is down 75% com-
by the pandemic, remote work is hurting his business. pared with prior to the pan-
working and the rise in "Until people come back to demic. He's down to one
popularity of more casual work, the problems will not shoeshiner, from the three
workwear when people be solved," said Khaimov, he employed before the
did return to the office. SC who benefits from com- pandemic. His shoeshiners
Johnson, which makes the muters traveling in and used to shine 60 or 70 shoes
biggest shoe polish brand, out of New York City who a day. Now a good day is
Kiwi, even said in January can't get their shoes shined 10 to 15 shines.
that it had stopped selling where they live. "And it's Cardenas' landlord gave
the brand in the U.K. due not good for landlords and him a break on rent, but
to softening demand (they for tenants also like us. So, he's still struggling, and has
still sell it in the U.S.) we're waiting. But eventu- seen several other shoe-
The last time the Census ally it will go back to nor- shine stores in the area
listed shoeshining as a dis- mal, we hope. But when close. Still, he is noticing an
crete business was 2007, we don't know." uptick in people returning
when only 30 establish- Rory Heenan, 38, an ac- to work and hopes business
ments were counted. The countant in Philadelphia, slowly returns to normal by
more-encompassing shoe said that as a young boy the spring.q