How a Swiss Company Is Trying to Revolutionize Running Shoe Sustainability and Performance – New Legs for the Running Shoe Industry

Image by Hans Braxmeier from Pixabay

June 22nd, 2021 - Author: Fabian Vermum

The American environmentalist and philosopher John Muir once famously said that: “In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks.”

Biomechanically speaking, running is nothing more than faster walking. The only real difference between walking and running is that while running, there is a moment where one foot is not touching the ground. As you all know and probably experienced many times, running is also a circular motion. It requires the individual to repeat the same motion sequence over and over. The more fluid your circle is, the better your running style. In case you want to know how a perfect running circle looks like: Just watch Eliud Kipchoge run in slow motion.

Coming back to the father of national parks, John Muir. A study has indeed shown that spending at least 120 min a week in nature benefits your well-being. The meta-analysis even found evidence that outdoor running has a more prominent effect on mental well-being than indoor running. I totally agree. I have always hated running on treadmills inside a gym. I prefer the fresh air and that feeling of achievement I get after running my favorite route along the famous Rhine-river.

But the future for outdoor runners like myself doesn’t look so bright. The climate crisis is approaching quicker and quicker and threatens to destroy the beauty of nature we all like to enjoy while running. And like everybody else, we are a part of the problem. A new pair of synthetic running shoes generates 30lbs (~14kg) of C02-emissions. A study reports that three million shoes are produced every day. The materials are responsible for the greatest share of carbon emissions (68%).

That is nothing new for the major running shoe companies. For example, Adidas has already committed to reduce its carbon footprint of running shoes, and Nike has increased its investment in recyclable materials. ON, a much smaller running shoe company from Switzerland has taken this to the next level: A circular running shoe.

Going full circle with Cyclon

With their new shoes, ON is merging two systems: The system of circular economy and the system of a sharing economy. Especially, the sharing economy is already quite common in other industries. Just think of apps like Airbnb, Uber where the focus lies on sharing resources. But the sharing economy doesn’t just stop here. There are new concepts for renting furniture or even renting clothes. Running shoes are the next step (pun intended).

Three months ago, ON officially introduced Cyclon, their first circular running show, with this video. But what does circularity mean? Well, it's pretty simple. Circularity is based on one key principle:

Keep Products and Materials in Use

Translating this to running shoes means "to take a material and keep it in the system, by not creating waste, by using it over and over again,” as the innovation lead of ON explains in the video. The shoe is made entirely from castor beans. Sounds very promising until now, but how does it look in practice?

You pay a monthly subscription fee of 29,99€. That may sound quite pricey at first but consider this: According to runner’s world, the average running shoe lasts between 450 and 850km, while ON expects Cyclon to last an average of 600km.

People who run 30km per week would need to switch their shoes every twenty weeks. For those twenty weeks, the Cyclon costs 150€, about the price of any other running shoe. For those of you who run more than that, Cyclon gets even more lucrative. 

Consider how many kg of CO2 you could save in the future. However, there is one hurdle you have to climb before doing all that. For ON to send you one of their first edition of Cyclon 5000 other runners in your region need to order the shoe as well.

However, there is one aspect that will truly determine if the concept of ON can succeed: performance. For running shoes, the soles make the difference. Unfortunately, the soles are also the hardest part to produce sustainable.  The ON tech is trying to change that and make combine sustainability with performance.

For many athletes (including me), running is not about owning the newest shoe, it's about the experience. The beauty of nature is for many of us a big part of this experience. ON’s bold approach to a circular economy has the power to change running forever. Owning a shoe might not be the standard anymore in 10 or twenty years. 

Subscription models have already prevailed in many industries like music (Spotify), or movies (Netflix, Disney, etc.). Running might not be an exception to this trend. This podcast from Harvard Business Review discusses the many benefits a subscription model gives organizations. While ON made the first step, Nike and Adidas are already planning similar circular running shoes. 

It will be interesting to see how these more sustainable shoes perform once they hit the market. If they can match the performance of traditional running shoes, I can clearly see a future where most runners won't own shoes anymore.