The Quality of Footwear Fit: What we know, don't know and should know

Abstract

Even though fit ranks as one of the most important considerations in the purchase of a shoe, the quality of fit has no metric and is hence poorly assessed. Manufacturers, retailers, and customers tend to use trial and error techniques to improve footwear fit. This approach is rather cumbersome and very unscientific. In this paper, we present a methodology to assess and thereby quantify footwear fit so that comfort can be predicted and consequently improved lasts and shoes can be produced that match different shapes of feet.