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by Brendan Dunne
Sneaker companies should be celebrating over the plunging prices of oil.
According to Barron's, the 60 percent year over year downturn in prices will bring production costs down on apparel and footwear that use synthetic, oil-based materials. As any readers could probably deduce after scrolling through the news feed on this site and seeing how heavily new shoes rely on synthetics, this could be a huge boon for sportswear companies like Nike and Under Armour.
The bad news is that this won't necessarily drive sneaker prices down, as rising labor costs in Asia continue to offset money saved on materials.
