Interview: Warrior Footwear “Rendezvous with Bobby Touran”

Bobby Touran

Rendezvous with Bobby Touran

You might have spotted these foreign sneakers decorated with Chinese ensembles making their way from Shanghai onto shelves at sneakers shops and boutiques around NYC. If you can’t read “Chinese” Warrior Footwear is the name. These low-top bad boys aren’t new jacks. They have been established in the sneaker game before brands like Nike and Adidas and are breaking new ground in the U.S .We caught up with the young, ambitious, Boston native Bobby Touran one of the Co-founders of the legendary brand to break down the history and culture behind Warrior.

JGM
What made you guys want to come out with a sneaker line?

Bobby Touran
Basically the opportunity came up when myself and two of my friends saw a great opportunity from both a fashion sense and a business sense. We all studied economics and we were all interested in doing business. Starting our own business and company kind of seemed like the best way to get the experience that we wanted fitted for our personalities.

JGM
What inspired you guys to do this line?

Bobby Touran
Again it’s just really an opportunity we saw. If someone comes by something that they just can’t pass up some people act on it and some don’t. What happened was my partners who are in Shanghai saw some people wearing these shoes. My friend thought to himself “Those look kind of cool”, and got himself a pair. They were getting a lot of compliments all the time. We thought, if people here like them maybe people in the states would like them. They’ve just been so popular for so long now and with everything in the U.S. being retro everything just fell into place.

JGM
When was the brand established?

Bobby Touran
The brand started in 1935, so the silhouette for the shoe, the boxes and everything else is 80 years old, ancient really. Think about how much fashion changes in just half a year. The pair that I’m wearing now, the“WB1″ is like the Air Jordan of China. Everyone from famous people to common people has had these. It’s very different from American fashion and culture in that sense, so that part of it is what interests us.

JGM
How did you go about bringing a Chinese brand to the U.S.? Were there any doubts about an American group of guys bringing in a Chinese culture?

Bobby Touran

Sure, of course, and we still have doubts today. I think that’s normal. When we faced this opportunity we knew that there was this sort of stigma behind people’s thinking. Since it’s made in China they might associate poor quality with the sneaker. We’re doing a partnership with an art student from Finland. She went to China and saw people wearing Warriors and thought they were amazing. She started a book called Book of Warriors and when u bought it you would also receive free pair of the sneakers. Now that she doesn’t sell the book anymore, she decided to work on it with us to bring the brand to the U.S.We’re just bringing Chinese culture here.

JGM
Are you an American branch of warrior footwear?

Bobby Touran
Basically, we are Warrior Footwear LLC (limited liability corp) we are totally financed by our own money. We’re the sole partners of the company.

JGM
Where does the design come from?

Bobby Touran
It’s a classic kung fu silhouette. The writing on the back says Hui Li translated in Mandarin which is “warrior” in Chinese. We’re thinking about doing collaborations with some of the stores that we are carried in. We’re thinking about doing limited edition colors. For example, a certain color exclusively for one store. Also beyond just colors and keeping the design, we’re thinking about doing product modifications. If we wanted to adjust the sneaker so it was better for a certain purpose that would be an option too. We’re definitely going to try and introduce high-tops, leather and suede shoe. They are unisex, anyone can wear any pair .The target audience are ages sixteen to thirty and even older if they could appreciate it. The retail price for them are only sixty dollars. Since its something very classic it definitely goes well with a lot of outfits. Its not limited to one person.

JGM
Is there any Warrior Clothing?

Bobby Touran
We’re collaborating with this brand in Shanghai called The Thing. It’s led by this pretty well known Shanghai underground artist. He wants to collaborate and do apparel, so it would be an extension of our brand. That’s what we would be looking to do in terms of clothing.

JGM
Do you plan on marketing the shoes at major distributors?

Bobby Touran
Yes in order to be a kind of company that has leverage and that can really compete with other brands and can compete with the type of endorsement and taste maker attention that can kinda give you the freedom to do what you want a artistically, You have to be selling shoes at the end of the day.

JGM
Most brands would like to keep their product exclusive I thought

Bobby Touran
That’s what we’ve been doing a lot of people try to start out in big stores like they’ll try to come up with something really generic. We didn’t wanna do that at all. For example Gucci or any other major fashion brand ,starts at a small boutique level and after ten years you can buy a Gucci belt at Macy’s. Originally you can only buy it at boutique and that’s what were trying to and slowly grow with the brand ourselves.

JGM
I saw your shoes in ALIFE. How did you guys get hooked up with them?

Bobby Touran
What happened was my self and my partner Danny went to ALIFE. I researched the store because im sort of in charge of NYC. I knew that was the kind of top the spot for sneakers in the city an we just went to them in person with shoes in a bag and said look this is our brand this is what were doing we wanna work with you guys what do you think about this. They are really great guys they have really helped our company pick. we hope to collaborate with Jesse who is the buyer for the store. In the coming weeks we hope to do a collaboration with them.

JGM
Where do you see yourself in four years with the brand?
Bobby Touran
“In four years we’re talking about having gone through seven different styles of shoes so there would be modifications in existing models. We would have also introduced new models. We would also have several different colors in each shoe. Four years from now we would definitely be sold in some major retailers. We would also have a major presence in all U.S. cities and definitely representation internationally.”

Photos By Demilade