I take a two mile walk every morning, rain, snow, ice or shine. I wore out my pair of walking shoes, so I decided to go whole hog and buy an expensive pair. I stated to the shoe salesman that I wanted something like the ones I had worn out so I could walk on icy sidewalks and the like. He assured me that the pair he sold me would be good for that.
So, yesterday, after winding up on all fours for the fifth time, I decided to return my shoes. Well, the store policy is you can return them within 14 days if they had not been worn. Hmmm, you can take a car for a test drive, can't you?
I convinced another salesman to replace my shoes. He did a little talking with someone in the back room and said the following. The shoes that I had returned had a one piece polyurethane sole/heel. The replacement ones had a one piece "rubber" sole/heel. It felt softer to my calibrated fingernail. I had shoes in the past with a crepe sole/heel which did perform well on ice. Of course, they wore out rapidly on cement.
My question is, shouldn't there be a standard way of rating shoes for grip on various surfaces? I can understand why the stores don't want shoes returned after use. But there should be some kind of "test drive," if you will, or standard for walking shoes. What materials are best for differing conditions?
Has anyone any opinions on the subject? Any good advice in how to pick shoes of this nature? After all, salesman assured me these would be good for my purposes. And I took his word as I and my wife had been shopping at that shoe store for years and have always been satisfied. In fact I am still satisfied as I was able to return the shoes despite "store policy."
Al