Shoeshining, a fun competition that everyone can participate in, there have been many large and small activities and competitions in China. In the 2023 China Trunk Show, there are a few enthusiastic registrations, but professional players stepped in.
This was the first time I was shocked on the spot, because the professional players are really too strong, so strong that competitors are desperate!
Speaking of shoe shine services, there are several in China, namely Shanghai shoe shine theme coffee shop Gentlemaker, Beijing shoe brand Twinkima.G, Shanghai brand Jinzhi, as well as Wentao and Zhang Fei. The last two are mainly cobblers, and they just joined the Oct Tenth team.
In this competition, Gentlemaker offered to serve as a judge, which turned the competition into a battle between Jinzhi and Twinkima.G. Badia also sent a new team member to get a feel for the atmosphere. Amateur Super entered the battle fearlessly.
The supplies for this competition are provided by the Japanese brand Bootblack, which may not be as famous as Saphir, but the degree of professionalism in the field of shoe shine is probably still above it due to the subdivision of the Japanese.
And the prizes of each contestant are also provided by Bootblack!
Supplies for this competition, High Shine Base and High Shine Coat provided by Bootblack. Then shoe shine cloth. The water dispenser is carried by the contestants themselves. Competition shoes are Wholecut oxford made of Wenheimer black boxcalf from Ray Kwok.
The contestant is inspecting the unopened High Shine combination.
Feel the cloth.
Before the game, Nick, WU Zijing, who wore a suit, and the manager of Jinzhi communicated with the Judge, Gentlemaker team, and the one wearing glasses in the middle was Mr. Akiyama, the head of Bootblack China.
Looking at Nick’s smile, it seems that he feels that the victory is in hand.
The host is Dr. Justice, who is carefully reading the rules and procedures of the competition before the competition.
The competition is about to start, TikTok, Red live broadcasts were online at the same time, and the live camera also aimed at Dr. Justice.
Doctor Justice introduced the rules to the contestants, and the contestants prepared all the supplies.
The game is on the verge. The time is 20 minutes, shine one shoe.
If it is just toe, I believe that many enthusiasts can do it and have a fairly good effect, but this shoe shine competition, deliberately choosed wholecut Oxford, was to increase the difficulty, such as transition from toe to waist. The heel is also a mandatory place to shine. Under these conditions, many people hear 20 minutes and say that they really can’t do it.
As soon as the competition began, we immediately saw two genres, one was hand-applying, white-clothed girl, Tiantian is from Jinzhi, and enthusiast Super, both dipped their fingers in shoe wax and then applied the surface of the shoe.
In addition, Badia’s handsome used a shoe shine cloth. Professional player from Twinkima.G also used shoe shine cloth.
At this step, I saw another clear difference, which was a very important reason why Jinzhi won in the end.
High Shine can be compared to Saphir’s Mirror Gloss, but Bootblack divides this into Base and Coat. Understood by the name, Base is for building a smooth foundation, and Coat is covered last, so everyone except Tiantian followed this order. But as soon as Tiantian came up, she applied Coat on the whole shoe at a very high speed.
Another professional aspect is that Nick has been showing Tiantian and letting her master the rhythm according to the timer. In fact, everyone present felt that Tiantian’s speed was already super fast, but it seemed that Nick felt that this was just right.
Because I was standing next to Nick and I inquired him, why use Coat instead of Base first? He said that if there was enough time and someone was particularly familiar with the physical properties of the product, he could use Base first, but the game time is too short so that they choosed such tactics.
The problem with Bootblack High Shine Base is that the wax particles are larger and take longer to completely smooth it out, and if hand speed is not fast enough and the temperature is not high enough, it will make the wax not push away, then even if it is Coated later, it is useless.
Badia’s handsome guy was not familiar with the product, so the final effect was not very good. During the live broadcast, some of the comments were not very friendly, and it can be admitted that it was a mistake, but the next time he will be more familiar with the product, it will definitely be much better.
As professional players, the orders of Twinkima.G and Jinzhi are also different. Twinkima.G treated the toe cap first, and quickly achieve a mirror effect on the toe.
Tiantian from Jinzhi didn’t care whether the toe is mirrored or not, and she keeps coating the whole shoe, layer after layer.
By the end of the game with 8 minutes left, she started using a water dispenser to get water while she started using Base. The effect is explosive, and the mirror effect of the full shoe immediately began to show!
The effect of conventional way of other players was equally excellent.
20 minutes may be a long time in normal times, but watching professional performances, it went by really quickly.
Gentlemaker team scored the items from a professional point of view, and the shoes are sent to Red for online voting.
Tiantian
Twinkima.G
Super
In the end, the results of the professional selection and the online voting were completely consistent.
Tiantian from Jinzhi won the competition, and Mr. Akiyama presented the championship trophy.
Tiantian also received a pair of shoes from handmade shoe brand Gulun.
The runner-up was won by Twinkima.G, and the trophy was presented by Gentlemaker manager Don.
Amateur player Super also showed a brilliant performance and won the third place.
Summary
Originally, such an event was mainly entertainment, but the performance of the professional players shocked me very much, and at the same time, I felt that their service was worth the money.
