Miriam Jordan; In Wooing Brazil's Teens, Converse Has Big Shoes to Fill

Local Makers of Knockoff Hi-Tops Offer Cheap, Jazzy Sneakers; Can the U.S. Original Compete?

For as long as Olukemi Salami can remember, she has worn All Star canvas sneakers. Currently, she owns four pairs: navy blue, tattered denim, solid black and black with gold moons and suns.“I owned my first pair of All Stars before I was 8-years-old,” says the Brazilian teenager. “I’ve always liked this American brand.”

So do millions of other Brazilians. Only the U.S. and Japan sell more pairs each year, according to Converse Inc., the U.S. company that launched the athletic shoe in 1917. But there is a catch: The All Stars sold in Brazil aren’t authentic, and even avid fans, like Miss Salami, have no idea. Within months, the real thing is expected to hit Brazilian stores. The question is: Will the authentic Converse All Star manage to fill the shoes of its pirated predecessor?

In 1979, a Brazilian company registered the All Stars brand locally as its own. Since then, All Star Artigos Esportivos Ltda. has been selling annually about one million pairs of a shoe almost identical to the Chuck Taylor All Star, the most popular sneaker in the history of athletic footwear.

“It’s more than just producing a similar shoe—that happens all the time,” says Timothy Ouellette, vice president of Converse. “These guys actually registered our trademark.”

Vivid billboards along Brazil’s freeways advertise “All Star No.1.” The sneakers look genuine, down to the circle with the five-pointed blue star on the high-top model. But the Brazilian lookalikes cost one-third of the U.S. price, or $12, making them affordable to a vast audience in this country of 170 million.

Offered in checked and flowery patterns, or zany varieties, such as a fire-inspired model with an orange flame, many designs aren’t available in the U.S. The Brazilians have “surpassed the talent of the company that owns the brand, thanks to constant innovation,” says Herick Gomez, chief buyer for Noa-Noa, an upmarket children’s shoe chain. “These All Stars are trendy among the rich and the poor alike.”
The knockoff version is a hit in Brazil among teenagers in blue-collar suburbs, MTV hosts and soap-opera stars, as well as upper-class toddlers and their mothers. “It’s my best selling sneaker,” says a salesman at Tody Calçados, one of São Paulo’s oldest shoe stores. Like most retailers, he thought the Brazilian company had a licensing agreement with Converse.

Converse first went to court against the Brazilian firm in the 1980s. But distracted by financial woes back home, it allowed the case to languish in the ‘90s. The company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2001. After closely held Footwear Acquisition Inc., North Andover, Mass., bought the shoe company’s assets and changed its own name to Converse, it decided the Brazilian market was too enticing to ignore and hired lawyers to revive the battle. A federal industrial-property court in Rio de Janeiro last month canceled the Brazilian firm’s registration of the All Star trademark.

The Brazilian company didn’t reply to e-mailed questions requested by a company spokeswoman and its owners didn’t agree to an interview. But in a statement published in a local shoe-industry trade magazine, the company says: “We are the sole owners of the commercial name . . . ‘All Star.’”

All Star Artigos criticizes Converse for divulging the decision by the federal court in Rio de Janeiro and says the court’s ruling “is not definitive” and “is to be appreciated by the Superior Court of Justice,” which suggests that the Brazilian sneaker company plans to appeal the decision. However, legal experts believe it would be hard to win an appeal at a time when Brazil faces U.S pressure to crack down on intellectual-property violations.

Through its local licensee, Alon International, Converse expects later this year to start making its own All Stars in the southern state of Rio Grande do Sul. “Finally, Brazil is going to be able to buy the original Converse product,” says Mr. Ouellette, the Converse executive, who plans a big marketing blitz and educational campaign among retailers and consumers.

Yet even if the original All Star is superior in quality, as Converse asserts, it is going to be a hard sell. “I like these All Stars because they’re cute, comfortable and cheap,” says Aline Micheli, 12, summing up the feelings of several adolescents outside a São Paulo school one afternoon.

Converse hasn’t decided how much it plans to charge for the sneaker, which retails for about $35 in the U.S. “We face a marketing quandary because this other shoe has been sold at such a low price for such a long time,” Mr. Ouellette concedes.

“We will make a superhuman effort to keep selling All Stars at the current prices,” says Paulo Roberto Ferreira, Alon’s managing director. “We want Chuck Taylor All Stars to remain a mass-market product.” Mr. Ferreira says Converse is still developing a marketing plan. But if the Converse sneaker ends up costing more, it may be a tough sell to Brazil’s youths: “I wouldn’t pay more for shoes that look like these,” says Miss Salami, the teenager who is a longtime All Star buff. “I’d buy a copycat brand.