NO LOVE LOST ?
An approximate history of the problem-child shoe company & it’s projected future
D.C. Shoes has been a company synonymous with not only East Coast skating but Philly skating definitively. If you ask most folks over the age of 35 on the topic of D.C. Shoes, they will most likely be able to recite most of the history of the shoes and the city itself. However, what has slipped through the cracks are interesting moments of the company's legacy…
Before we can cover the current day happenings, the early years of the company need to be covered first.
1991, Ken Block began to screen print t-shirts with a homemade set-up, eventually becoming the short-lived, California based, brand known as Eightball Clothing. Using the classic black eight-ball as the logo, he would print clothes for friends at first, but over time, it would locally catch on.
After some years, Ken and Damon Way, Danny Way’s brother, would team up to change Eightball Clothing into the infamous Droors Clothing Brand. Which began to spread through the Philly and New York scenes, eventually being promoted in skate mags and videos.
While Droors continued in its popularity, Block and Way worked on different type of brand, creating the D.C. Shoe Company alongside Droors. Within quick time, both the brands combined gathered around $1.4 million in sales. By 1994, D.C. Shoes had developed a team and decided it was time to release their first Pro shoe model, The Danny Way Signature.
Over the next year, D.C. Shoes would see exponential growth, even coming out with two significant additions to the company, The Clocker 1 and The Colin McKay Pro shoe. With these new shoes being created, a logo was made alongside the release, dawning the original circle with the “C” inside the logo.
D.C. Shoes continued to grow in popularity within the industry, but with this growth comes competition, even from outside the skate industry. Within the same year as the logo’s creation, Champion Clothing sued D.C. Shoes with claims that the logo is too similar to the “C” Champion logo.
This legal implication pushes D.C. to change its logo to the D.C. letters back to back with a 5 point star in the grasp of the “C”. With the new logo and with continually increasing sales, D.C. turned another team member pro with the Rob Dyrdek signature shoe or “The Dyrdek 1” which would also show off the new 5 point star logo.
1996, The Dyrdek 2 was created and sold with the same logo, however, the consistent success of D.C. Shoes attracted more unwanted attention, once again from outside the industry. Converse shoes, who did not have a skate program yet, sees some similarities in the “5 Point Star” logo and decides to sue D.C. for using similar logos.
Once again caught in legal issues, D.C. Shoes was pushed to change. So the 5 star logo is tweaked to a 7 point star, which is still in use today. With the continuous legal issues and costs of redesign, D.C. Shoes must do some reevaluation. While Droors was running in the background, it lost its corporate financial interest and was divested, officially ending the Droors Clothing brand before 2000.
At the turn of the century, D.C. Shoes secured around $1 Billion in sales for the year despite the several logo changes. All along the East Coast, skateboarding is synonymous with D.C. Shoes. Even through lawsuits, it has proven itself as a successful and prominent skate shoe brand. In 2004, the brand conglomerate known as “Quiksilver” buys out D.C. Shoes for $87 Million, but this buyout would not put a stop to D.C.’s legal issues.
More complications with the logo, D.C. Comics attempts to sue on the grounds of using a similar logo, consisting of similar letters “D & C” and including a “Star.” In D.C.’s good fortune, the case is closed because of the difference in product being sold and DC Comics drops the case with nothing.
Years go by, and D.C. Shoes still maintained a solid grasp on its portion of the industry even after the buyout,that is until around 2009. The Great Recession hits, and most skate brands with D.C. included, begin to feel the pressure of a struggling economy. Meanwhile as smaller brands are struggling, larger (non-skate) brands see the industry show its first signs of faltering. With their almost infinite budget, advertising abilities, and global connections, they see this time as an opportunistic opening to enter the skate industry. Moving in on the already shaky industry and beginning to smother smaller brands.
Still recovering from The Recession, corporate owner of D.C. Shoes, “Quicksilver” was bought out by a *parent company known as Authentic Brands Group (A.B.G.) in 2013. This would not only have the parent company secure decision making power over Quicksilver, but also the companies Quicksilver once owned as well, including D.C.
** Taken from Google
A "parent company" is a company that owns a controlling interest in another company, also known as a subsidiary, which gives the parent company the power to manage and oversee the operations of that subsidiary company; essentially, it's a company that owns a majority stake in another company, allowing it to exert significant influence over its operations.
January 4th, 2024: A.B.G. sizes up D.C. Shoes’ productivity and relevance in the global shoe market, and decides to give “creative control” of the brand to B.B.C. International. (There is no information online about what they mean by B.B.C. Could mean anything)
B.B.C. Int. currently owns but is not limited to: Tommy Hilfigure, K. Swiss, Micheal Kors and Polo. All of these brands were highly regarded 20 years ago, but now can be seen in discount stores and carry none of the regard they did in their prime, fully neglecting the niche cultural significance they once stood for. This trend is a direct result of B.B.C.’s control over the brands. It purchases failing brands, and rather than closing it, B.B.C. trims the fat (fires most of the pre-existing staff and totally changes the brands image) then sells to the cheapest buyer, like Marshalls, Ross and Zappos.com. B.B.C. Int. is the failing brand chop shop.
As of recently, things seem to be getting more dismal. In December 2024, D.C. fired most of their pre-existing marketing and development team, entering the “TRIM THE FAT” phase. But it doesn’t look so bad for everyone at D.C. “Several high-profile D.C. employees have already found jobs elsewhere, D.C.’s Ex-Global GM Cory Long is now at Sorel and Ex-Global Head of Marketing Micheal Minter now at Reef.” The future seems uncertain for the once East Coast giant.
February 6th, 2025: After a year, D.C. is still owned by A.B.G. and B.B.C. still seems to have “creative control” over the brand. The team roster seems to have gone through some more sudden changes. Bilyeu, Shanahan, Lucien Clark and Jah still continue to be supported by the brand, as seen in the recent video titled “No Big Deal”. However, there seems to be less widespread support from D.C. Shoes. In 2023, the video titled “OK BET” was released, displaying the new and promising international AMs of the company, Adilson Pedro and Thomas Dritsas. Leading up to this premiere, both can be seen wearing D.C. 's in instagram posts, but if you look today, Adilson wears Nike and Thomas wears Nikes and Adidas, both stopping in 2024. Skating alongside Thomas on the “Cash Only” team, Aleka (“Tuna Took”) Lang, seems to have a similar trend, changing from consistent D.C. clips (even a Cash Only x DC Shoes collaboration in 2023) to changing entirely overnight in 2024, around the same time as the two promising AMs severing ties with DC. Looking across most sources, the only traces of the more recent members to the team are left over on outdated ads or posts.
(Pedro still on outdated DC Argentina website, even tho he was cut off team before 2025)
With these unfortunate drops in mind, there are some positives through the post-buyout phase of D.C. Many of the Philly skaters continue to be supported by the brand, directly or indirectly, with Ant Rosado being featured in “No Big Deal” and continued support for Bilyeu and Jah. With the turbulent period D.C. seems to be going through, it is promising to see not only a Philly based video released under the D.C. brand, but also the two major pillars of Philly excellence still being supported.