I Have Small Feet and Zappos.com is Amazing

The Culp side of my family is known for their height. (Their lack of it.) I definitely fit right in. The funny thing is, while I don't have much trouble finding clothes that fit me, (well my wife has become an expert at shortening pants) I do have trouble finding shoes that fit me. I carry my 5 foot, 4 inch frame around on size 6.5 feet. Shoe manufacturers must not make many shoes my size, because they are about impossible to find in stores.

I realize I have abnormally small feet. But, all those guys who have regular size feet HAVE to wear my size at some point on their journey toward having regular size feet. What do all those guys (mostly kids, I know) wear when they go through my size? Not kids sizes. They just do not fit. They are way too tight.

Since I have a hard time finding shoes that fit, I am just a little obsessive about finding shoes (that I like) that fit. I troll eBay for shoes quite a bit. . . buying and then selling when they don't work. Did I mention I like GOOD shoes? At cheap prices? That fit?

I've been trolling eBay for probably the past couple of years and skimming every shoe store I enter for a decent pair of shoes to wear to work in the warmer months. (I'm all set right now for winter with a pair of Merrell winter mocs, which actually fit me in a 7.5.)

With warmer weather approaching, I knew I needed to do something about shoes to wear to work this spring. Enter Zappos.com

Zappos has GOOD shoes. They don't tend to have cheap prices. They have shoes that fit me.

Zappos ships shoe orders for free. They also offer this great return policy in which you can return any shoes you order from them for a full refund and they pay the return shipping!

I ordered four pairs of shoes from them that I thought I might like for work.

• Order the shoes.
• Try them on.
• Keep the pair I like the best (if any.)
• Return the other three (or all four) pairs.
  
• It would be cheaper than driving to Elkhart.

Here are the shoes I ordered.

I think I figured out the "free return shipping" aspect of Zappos' business plan, because instead of keeping "the pair I like best," I ended up keeping three of the four pairs. They were nice shoes, they weren't cheap, but it was easy shopping and they fit!

The pair I did not keep were the Ecco shoes in the bottom picture. They were exorbitantly expensive and a little too big anyway.

I had no problem returning the Eccos to Zappos for a refund. I simply logged onto their site. Clicked that I wanted to return that pair and printed a prepaid UPS label. I boxed them up and Kristi dropped the box off at the UPS Store. About a week later Zappos refunded the full amount of the Ecco shoes to my credit card.

This next part of the story is so amazing that you may not even believe it. It is true. I ordered the shoes from Zappos on "2009-01-24 20:02:51."

That's SATURDAY night, January 24th at 10:02 PM with their standard free shipping.

The shoes were delivered on MONDAY, January 26th at 12:47 PM.

Amazing!