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The Rise, Roll, and Retreat of Heelys - An Unforgettable Footwear Phenomenon · Dirt Nap City - History's Most Interesting Dead People

• 0:08
  SPEAKER_02: Alex, have you ever been to a shopping mall?
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_02: I have been to many shopping malls.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_02: Not recently though.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_01: Not recently.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_01: No.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_01: Did you ever see a kid walking along?
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it looks like a nice kid, probably dressed up a little bit, maybe got some um got a polo by Ralph Lauren.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: He got some OP shorts.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_01: Um and all of a sudden he's looks like he's wearing some vans, but then all of a sudden he just starts gliding across the floor.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_02: With the uh the skate shoes to yeah.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_02: Do you remember?
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_02: Roller, roller shoes.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_02: Do you remember what they were called?
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_02: No, I don't.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_02: They were called Heelys.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_02: I don't think I knew that.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so so these shoes, uh, Heelys, they had a kind of a skateboard wheel in the heel.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: And there was a way that you could activate that wheel to come out, and then you kind of like stood on your heels, you balanced on your heels, and you could skate on them.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_01: And then when you weren't skating, the wheel would go back up into a recessed area and you could walk on them, just like regular shoes.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_01: I remember those.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_01: I remember a certain type of person.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: You didn't you didn't rock those, did you?
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_01: You know what's really funny is someone gave me a pair of those um as an adult uh as for my birthday.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_01: So I had a pair of Heelys for a little while.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_01: How old were you?
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_01: Oh gosh.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, this is probably 20 years ago, so I was in my 30s.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_01: Older than you should have been wearing.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, yes.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_01: And they weren't easy.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_01: A Heely, the Heelys were not easy.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_01: They were definitely uh uh you had to practice.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_01: And because you couldn't just like have your feet right next to each other and lean on your heels because you'd kind of be off balance and fall backwards, you had to put one leg kind of out in front of the other in kind of a like a stretching, you know, track star kind of way, and then lift your toes up so that the heels would make contact with the ground.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_01: They were they were they were pretty hard to do.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_01: Just a good skill.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_02: But I'll bet you if you were a skater, they were awesome.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_01: And I think they were definitely something that a lot of kids, you know, I think the impact of seeing someone do it when and do it well made a lot of kids want to try it.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I can picture the kid right now.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, going going through the mall, just just uh like going right past you.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_01: Well, they were invented by a guy named Roger Adams in the late 1990s.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: He was in California late 1990s.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_01: These were an early 2000s thing, the Heeley's.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, okay.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um, he was in California on vacation, actually, watching people skating, biking, walking, and he thought, wow, it'd be kind of cool if I could combine walking and skating.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_01: Now he was a skating enthusiast.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if Roger Adams was a skateboard enthusiast or a roller skating or a rollerblading enthusiast, but it said it said skating enthusiast.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_01: And by the way, did I mention he was a clinical psychologist?
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_02: No.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_02: What I call you're an enthusiast of sorts, right?
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_02: You're you'd call you maybe a drone enthusiast.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_02: Well, no, I actually get paid to fly a drone sometimes, so I'd Oh, enthusiast uh does that um mean amateur?
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_01: I think so.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I guess I guess you can be an enthusiast and still be a pro because you're still enthusiastic, but I think you I think when you get paid to do it, you take it to another level.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_01: You're a professional.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a professional drone pilot.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_02: I thought enthusiast you is the like the old timey word for what we would now call like a nerd.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_02: Like like you know what I mean?
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_02: Like you're just really, really into something.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but does that necessarily make you nerdy?
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_02: I mean No, no, not nerdy.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_02: That's just the what we call people that are really into something now.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_02: You know, like oh, I'm a science nerd or I'm a sports nerd or whatever.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, okay, okay.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_01: Sports enthusiasts, sports nerd.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, I could see where that's well.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_01: He was a skating enthusiast, lifelong skating enthusiast.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_01: And he after he decided to do this, he took a pair of tennis shoes, he took a urethane wheel, and he kind of carved it out and put a little little rod or axle in it and put the wheel in it, and um actually started to test it, realized it was kind of cool once you learned how to do it.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_01: And the big thing was he patented the design.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_01: So that was the thing was this patented design to be able to remove the wheel or put the wheel in.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_01: Now I I don't remember if the wheel was always there and it slid up into an apartment, or if it was uh something that you actually pulled out, you know, when you weren't you like you kept them in your pocket or something.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: Do you remember that?
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_02: I I don't think you kept them in your pocket.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_02: I always pictured guy like doing um kind of a tap move with the with the heel or the toe and having them pop out.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_02: And then yeah, that's what I remember too.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, doing kind of a move where you would kind of almost run.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_02: When you when you stopped it, it's almost you go into a little run.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and then you and then you go on your heels and they would pop out and you could just skate along.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_02: That's but I would think it would be more dangerous like having the wheel walking and having the wheel come out would be way worse than Yeah, all of a sudden.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_01: All of a sudden, you just you just do the you just do the cartoon banana peel.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_01: Woo!
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and you would think over time when the spring gave out that could happen.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, it it could.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_01: It could.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I I don't think he I don't think many people kept their Healys for you know, they were sort of a uh a little bit of a disposable shoe, maybe.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_01: Well, so this guy, Roger Adams, founded a company called um well originally it was called Healing Sports Limited, and that's H-E-E-L-I-N-G, Healing Sports Limited, and then that became Healing or Healy's Inc.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_01: in 2000.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_01: So he had figured out how to make this thing, he patented the invention, he found a manufacturer, he started his demo.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_02: The heel of the toe, I mean, the heel of the foot was how you got him out.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's why.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_02: That sounds right.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_01: That sounds right.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_01: When they were in the back of the shoe, too.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you tap the heel and then they would come out.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: So they really took off between you you remember the years these were big?
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: Can you can you really not?
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_01: I would have said the early 90s.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_01: No, 2004 to 2007 is when the heelys were big.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_01: It was sort of a you know, that's kind of when maybe you know, X games were coming out, street culture, action sports, you know, they they kind of had this um skater, you know, skater edge to them.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: Um and so between 2004 and 2007, they were very popular.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: Healy's Inc.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_01: went public in 2006, right at the peak of their craze, and they just went crazy.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_01: The the company Healy's made 44 million in sales, net sales in 2005, and then in 2006, that number tripled 120 million dollars in sales in 2005.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_02: Probably in certain parts of the country more than others, right?
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_02: Seems like a real California thing.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, but I think everybody, I mean, a lot of fashion starts on the coast, right?
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_01: It kind of starts in California or New York and kind of moves towards the center of the country.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you know, as you mentioned earlier, um, the whole idea of somebody rolling around indoors in a crowded area without a helmet on, that could be a little dangerous.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, but they love that.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_02: That's that's that's what they live for, though, those skater guys, right?
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: Well, there were a lot of injuries that happened.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_01: There were wrists, there were arms, there were elbows, a lot of surprising, man.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_01: Orthopedic injuries happening, fractures.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_01: Um it it's it's interesting because the shoes almost made you walk a little differently, too.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_02: So maybe give you knee problems and yeah, yep.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_01: There were there were kind of ancillary injuries.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um especially if you're 35 wearing those like you, Kelly.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, yes.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_01: I I did I did wear them a number of times and had some fun with them, but I never got really good at them.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_01: Um this led to kind of a cultural pushback.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it was called the Heelys Ban.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_01: So basically, there were signs all over public buildings, schools, shopping malls, airports, you know, those kind of places, hospitals that said no Healy's.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_01: And at the time, people knew what they were.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_01: If you saw that today, you might be like, What?
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_01: I honestly don't remember that word Healy's.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: You don't remember the name.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_01: H-E-E-L-Y-S, huh?
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_02: Healy's.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_02: No, I don't.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_02: I remember the shoes.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_02: I just don't remember that name at all.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_01: And they weren't bad-looking shoes.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think they were super comfortable, but they kind of looked like a pair of vans or something like that, as I recall.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_01: They weren't necessarily the black and white stripes, but just, you know, a um I want to say they actually weren't slip-on either.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: You had to have them laced up because they were they they had to be tight enough around your foot that when you went into your healy go healy go position, it would allow you to kind of feel like they were on your feet.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_01: So now it was not something you ever gave your son.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_01: No.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_02: No.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_02: Well, he was born around that time.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_02: That would have been really irresponsible.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I think there were some kids, some younger, not not born, you know, zero or one years old, but I think there were some kids in their, you know, five, six, seven years old that were rocking heelys.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: No, when he was younger, the the shoes that lit up was all the rage.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and so interesting enough, those were called uh LA Lights, and they were part of uh a collaboration with LA Gear that came later.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_01: The the lighted shoes.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_01: That was the big thing.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_01: Did your kids have those?
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_01: Um, oh yeah.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, my kids had some shoes that lit up, and we kind of liked them because you know we they were easy to spot.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_01: You could you could pick them out of a crowd, or if they were out in the dark, you could see them pretty easily.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_01: So the weird thing, and and you know, sometimes we do a little controversial stuff here on Dirtnap City when it comes to things like um uh dead ends, and the controversy here is that they're actually not dead.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_01: Healy's still exist, but the company was bought by a company called BBC International.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_01: Now, have you heard of BBC International?
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_01: No.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_01: So it's not has nothing to do with the British Broadcasting Corporation.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, it is a shoe brand, a global footwear company.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_01: They probably own Kenny's at some point, you know, they're this big.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_01: But they own major lifestyle brands like uh Polo, Champion, Tommy Hilfiger, K Swiss, New Balance, and they have these um uh entertainment licenses, licensing agreements with Marvel, Universal, Nickelodeon, you know, so so they're able to put a lot of uh big big brands or big name uh superheroes and stuff like that under their shoes.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_01: And they are actually the company, this uh BBC International, they're the ones that came out with the LA Lights.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah, um, you know, our boy Roger, after he founded it, Roger Adams, he he sold it.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_01: And even after having had a year where he made where where the company you know made a a net sale of uh over 120 million dollars, he ended up selling it for 11 million to this PVC International.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_01: Because it was a rocket ride, right?
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_01: It was a big it was a big thing that took off, and then people saw people getting injured, they were annoyed by it, they kind of burned out on it, and so he had to sell.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_01: They couldn't they couldn't keep up that pace, you know.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_01: They had expanded all their marketing and all their manufacturing to a point where everybody who had bought a pair of Heeleys at that point already had them.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_01: They weren't gonna buy more.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_02: But it seems like the kind of thing that every 25 years ago you could or every 25 years or so you could reintroduce and maybe make them a little safer.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_02: Because it seems like every new generation would kind of be into that.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_01: So so actually, funny you should say that.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um there was a guy named Bob Campbell.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_01: Um, he's the guy who originally came up with LA Lights, and he was an executive at BBC International, this company that bought them.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_01: He did do that.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_01: He came out with the um X2, which were two-wheeled models.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_01: So instead of one wheel in the heel, it had two wheels, and it was easier to do, and it actually has become instead of a cultural fad, um, the X2 and what formerly was known as Heelys are now more what we call a niche toy footwear.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_01: That's a thing.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_01: Would you ever want them for transportation?
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_01: I think if I lived at the top of a hill, I would.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_01: If I lived at the bottom of a hill, no.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_01: Well, so you you'd walk up and and glide down.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_01: So it's no no no no.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_01: I would glide down and then Uber back up.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_01: Oh that would be my that would be my way.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_01: So interesting.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's it's interesting because they they really aren't considered athletic equipment, they really aren't considered shoes.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_01: While some people might think they're a cool mashup of things, they're kind of the worst of both worlds.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, exactly.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_01: Uncomfortable as shoes.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and they're not great skates.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_01: You know, if you want to skate, just buy some skates.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um yeah.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so they really are for tricks, like and and just bothering people at the mall.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_02: Since malls don't really exist anymore.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_01: Where do you go, right?
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_01: Do you do you do you ride them at the airport?
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_01: No, they've been banned.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_01: The Great Healy ban.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, campuses is the only place left.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_01: I was actually, it's funny you say that.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_01: I was at the UT campus recently, and so many kids on scooters, skateboards, e-bikes.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and by skateboard I even mean electric skateboards, right?
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_01: Nobody, nobody rides things that are just foot powered or pedal powered anymore.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_01: No.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_01: No.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_01: We've all we've all gotten lazy, man.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_02: What what did you think of what did you think of riding an e-bike?
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_02: Well, you know, I have a complicated relationship, as you know, with with bicycles.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um, because uh I'm I'm built um I'm all torso.
• 15:14
  unknown: Yeah.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_02: Very short legs.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_02: So bikes aren't really made for me typically.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_02: So it's it's tough.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_02: So any kind of bike is bad for me.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_01: Well, well, if I got you a pair of Heelys for Christmas, would you try them?
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think so.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_01: I think I held to the no.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I I just I think it seems fun.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_02: Like if you once you once you can master it, it seems like a blast.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_02: But mastering it would kill you.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I remember when rollerblades came out.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_02: Um we got a uh got ourselves a pair of those and went down to uh Galveston to uh the seawall to to try them out, and it was actually pretty frightening.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_02: I thought because it makes it look so easy on TV.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you see people rollerblading.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_02: I wanted to be, you know, rollerblading on the beach, sound like fun.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_02: And it was terrifying.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I think I think that you skipped a step in that process, right?
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, uh you you buy the rollerblade, step one.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_01: Step two, you go to an empty parking lot right and you practice and you and you practice and you you know you use some um right walking sticks or some ski poles or something to keep yourself balanced, you wear lots of pads, and then after months and months of that, you go to the seawall and you take your shirt off and you put on your banana hammock and you just rollerblade on down.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, like it's the beginning of Three's Company.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_01: Let's do it.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_01: Well, uh, that's Healy's.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_01: I feel like they were something that um was definitely a flash in the pan.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: They still exist, but you know, I do think that a good um a good dead end can be something that had a huge popularity and then kind of went away, even if it still exists.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_01: Like drinking fountains or synthesizers.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_01: They're still around.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.