Word: spira
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Want a piece of the cutthroat running-shoe market, dominated by big brands like Nike, Adidas and Reebok? Try giving your sneakers some steroids. Spira Footwear, a four-year-old company based in El Paso, Texas, makes the world's only shoes with actual springs in the soles. The springs act as shock absorbers, reducing the stress on your feet. Spiras feel so good, they're illegal--at least to some. USA Track & Field, which sanctions some 4,000 road races each year, has banned Spiras for violating Rule 143 (3)(a), which states that "no spring ... may be incorporated...
...field, such a ban is a boon for business. Who doesn't want the forbidden fruit? The buzz plus a technology that delivers on its promise--the winner of a recent 3,100-mile ultramarathon in New York City, not sanctioned by USA Track & Field, finished the race in Spiras--has helped the company's sales jump, from $650,000 in 2002 to $3.9 million last year. The company now turns a profit and is on pace to double sales, to $8 million in 2005. "Spira is already comparable to the best running shoes on the market," says Ray Fredericksen...
Like many other successful small companies, Spira started by accident. In 1999 David Krafsur, an aerospace engineer living in Knoxville, Tenn., was thinking of ways to cushion his treadmill when he saw compact wave springs featured in a trade magazine. He figured the tiny springs could fit in shoes instead. Krafsur ordered some wave springs, and he picked up a $10 pair of skippies at Wal-Mart. As his wife rolled her eyes, Krafsur filleted the sole of each sneaker like a fresh trout, stuck springs in the heel and the forefoot and duct-taped them back together...
...sent the sample to his brother Andy, an El Paso lawyer. Andy was sold. He raised $6 million from 250 investors, most of them friends in El Paso. (Andy became Spira's CEO; David stayed on as president.) Last summer Spira hired veteran shoe developer Dan Norton, fresh from a stint with Adidas in Germany. Norton has tailored sneakers for Olympic champions like Carl Lewis and Sebastian Coe. It was like A-Rod signing with the Kansas City Royals. Under Norton's guidance, Runner's World named Spira's Genesis II shoe best update for spring...
...strolling at night with his older brother, Charles, locked in intense mental exchange. Charles killed himself in 1995. Crumb has also drawn their addicted mother, who tried - and failed miserably - to maintain the facade of normal family life. "There's a strong confessional element," says the Whitechapel's Anthony Spira. "He's constantly confessing his sins, his deepest urges, desires, fantasies." Says Crumb's wife, "As he's gotten older, he's questioned his spiritual center, his self, more and more." He has castigated his native country for its ugliness and greed, but, she says: "I don't think...