Even though it might seem as if they popped up a few decades ago, Converse All Stars appeared over a century ago. Marquis Mills Converse, manager of a shoe factory, decided to start his own business and open his own shoe factory, and so the Converse Rubber Shoe Company was founded in 1908 in Malden, Massachusetts. In the beginning, the factory only produced winterized rubber shoes for seasonal use, which were exported to Boston. In order to maintain its production and income all year round, Converse decided to start producing athletic shoes, and in 1915, the first tennis shoes were made. Within two to three years of business, around four thousand pairs of shoes left the factory on a daily basis, which was quite a large number at the time.

However, it was at that time that basketball started becoming popular in Europe as well, so Converse decided to take a new business risk in 1917. After exhaustive research on how to produce high quality shoes for professional basketball players, the company manufactured its first line of sneakers made with rubber soles and black fabric — the “All Star” line. The first sneakers, produced in 1917, were brown with black soles, but by the early 1920s, the first all-black models appeared, made of black fabric or leather with black soles.

Who is Chuck and why is his signature on every pair of Converse All Stars?

On every pair of Converse All Stars, there is a name: Chuck Taylor. Have you ever wondered who he was?

Charles ‘Chuck’ Taylor (1901–1969), a great basketball lover, used to practice and play for his high school team wearing his Converse All Stars. He played his first professional basketball game in 1919 when he was only seventeen. In search of a job, he joined the company’s retail chain in Chicago in 1921, and he also started playing for the factory’s basketball team — the Converse All Stars. He believed in the quality of the All Star sneakers, so he traveled all around the USA selling them; he took no money for this, nor did he expect the company to cover his travel expenses. Taylor’s idea was to travel to smaller towns and open basketball clinics, teach the young how to play basketball and negotiate deals with stores selling sporting equipment and shoes. As he was very charismatic, he earned the trust and sympathies of traders (as well as of numerous women) with ease wherever he went in his white Cadillac. Sales of sneakers went up thanks to Taylor and his wise marketing solutions, the most important one being the Converse Basketball Year Books, which have celebrated sport, healthy habits and love of basketball since 1922. Much of Taylor’s advice, and his ideas and observations made at the games he attended during his travels across the country changed the rules and the perspective of the game, while at the same time promoting teams, coaches, professional players and talented young players.

Based on his personal experience as a player, Taylor advised the manufacturers on how to improve the design, flexibility and the comfort of the shoes from the very beginning. According to one story, this is the reason he walked into Converse in the first place. This collaboration was so successful that he became the company’s ambassador in 1923, and his name became the trademark written on the Converse logo. This is when the sneakers became known as “Chucks” or “Chuck Taylor”. In the same year, the company made sneakers for the Rens (the New York Renaissance), an African-American basketball team, which was one of the most successful teams in American basketball history. During the 1930s, Converse All Stars earned the United States’ E for Excellence distinction.

They were worn at the Olympic Games in Berlin in 1936. It was the year when basketball officially became an Olympic sport, and the US team won the gold medal wearing Converse All Stars. In order to shine at the 1948 Olympic Games in London, the sneakers were improved by Taylor, so the first model with the trademark white rubber bumper toe caps at the front, white laces and white soles that we all know today appeared in 1947.

During World War II, Taylor served as a captain in military aviation and as a sports consultant, while coaching regional basketball teams. At the time, the company produced different clothes and shoes for pilots and soldiers, as well as jackets and protective rubber suits. After the war, the US soldiers continued to wear Converse All Stars while exercising, and they became the official shoes of the armed forces. Post-war Chucks were high-cut and there were three models: fabric or leather shoes with black rubber soles; and fabric shoes with white soles, and patriotic blue and red lines.

The Converse company was founded in 1908. Apart from its founder, innovator and visionary, the company actually owes it success to the success of one sport – basketball. Aware of the power of the “hoops”, the company decided to produce a type of sneakers to be worn by basketball players.

Converse All Stars quickly became popular among young people, as an obligatory part of the PE kit in high schools and colleges. The popularity of basketball and the foundation of the American league through the National Basketball Association (NBA) contributed to Converse All Stars becoming the shoes for anyone who wanted to play professional basketball. It is believed that in 1960s up to 90 per cent of all basketball players, whether they played for a college or a professional team, wore Converse All Stars. In 1962, the production of the first low-cut Oxford sneakers started and soon they became very popular due to their suitability. However, many teams started dying white sneakers with other colors and wearing colored laces to show their team colors. Therefore, in 1966, Converse introduced six new colors to its range (constituting 80% of the sneaker market at that time).

Chuck Taylor, recognized as an “ambassador of basketball”, entered the Naismith basketball hall of fame in Springfield, Massachusetts in 1968. He died a year later. At the time, other competitive manufacturers appeared who offered more colors, designs, better quality and comfortable air soles, completely winning the athletes over. The “One Star” (1974) and “Pro Leather/Dr. J” (1976) models never managed to revive Converse, which had dominated the market from the 1920s till the 1970s. Progressive and innovative ideas could be observed in slightly different models such as the “Star Chevron” and “Weapon”.

In the 1970s, it became quite obvious that comfortable sneakers had beaten shoes. Converse All Stars had already become a symbol and a part of many subcultures – greasers, rockers, punk rockers (as well as skaters and rappers soon after). Together with rock ’n’ roll, blue jeans and leather jackets, they seemed to stand up to the rigid society and system. In the film industry, which focused more and more on young people and their lives, Converse All Stars appeared in over four hundred films (according to certain research data, the high-cut black model appearing in 66% of them, the white in 22% and the red in 13%).

Statistics say that one pair of the popular Converse All Stars is sold every 43 seconds. While Converse All Stars used to be the shoes that only rock ‘n’ roll and heavy metal fans wore, today people of all ages wear them regardless of their style or taste in music. In the last few years, they have become much more expensive.

In the 1980s, buying a pair of Converse All Stars was definitely a matter of choice, since the market was full of many different sneakers that were more comfortable and more durable. In 1984, Converse was the official sponsor of the Summer Olympic Games in Los Angeles, and their sneakers had been worn in every finals game since 1936. In 1992, the company celebrated a total of 500 million pairs sold.

However, in the 1980s and the 1990s, Converse went through many periods of crisis, which finally lead to bankruptcy in 2001. The company was taken over by Nike in 2003, and manufacture was moved from North American factories to Southeast Asia. Many of the long-time fans of these sneakers have protested because of the cheaper, synthetic materials that are used more and more, as well as the badly glued parts and fading colors, so buying one of the remaining “Made in USA” pairs has become a thing of prestige. The Canadian Adbusters organization, which is strongly opposed to consumer society, began producing “Blackspot” sneakers, coloring the Converse logo black. Even though Nike has not significantly changed the Converse All Stars brand through production and marketing, with their new diverse prints they have become much more commercialized (yet still worshiped by opponents of consumer society) while profiting from the idea of a creative and unique individual. From being obligatory basketball wear, they have become “evergreen must-have casual kicks” and “accessories on sale”.

Another piece of evidence for the popularity of this brand is the fact that at one point, it constituted 80 per cent of the whole sneaker industry in the USA. However, in the years which followed, with the appearance and the strengthening of other sports shoes manufacturers, Converse lost the market battle at the beginning of the new millennium. Since 2003, Converse has been the property of the Nike Corporation.