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Soccer, Hawaii and some menorquinas.

If we had to include these three elements in a story, we would hardly write a better one than the one experienced in the first person by Alejandro Porras Martorell.

The founder of Alohas, a footwear firm that is a hit with its on-demand designs, is in charge of a brand that last year had a turnover of around

27 million euros.

The origin goes back almost a decade ago and was entirely fortuitous.

"I was a footballer in Spain and I had the bad luck that I broke my knee," the creator of the brand tells Yo Dona in a telephone conversation.

And he continues: "I realized that I wasn't going to be able to live football all my life. I had the opportunity to get a sports scholarship to play in the United States and get paid for my studies and

I ended up coming to Hawaii."

There we find the first clue in the story of Alohas, the meaning of his name.

But how did the idea of ​​creating shoes come about?

Everything was due to some Menorquinas, the footwear of Balearic origin synonymous with summer.

"I used to wear the menorcan sandals of a lifetime on the street and people in Hawaii would stop me on the street and say: 'hey, what about these cool shoes?'".

Alejandro's light bulb went on and

he began to sell menorcan

sandals under the name of Alohas Sandals.

It was the year 2015 and the brand focused exclusively on summer footwear.

Little by little they were diversifying the options, but the most relevant change came in 2019.

fashion on demand

Porras identified one of the big problems that the fashion industry had to face:

overproduction.

Textile surpluses had become a problem of the first order in a context where novelties were produced faster than they were sold.

Accumulating stock, or getting rid of it by burning it, was (and is) a common practice, although it is beginning to be prosecuted by law.

Porras decided to contribute his grain of sand and changed the business model of Alohas by betting on 'on demand'.

That is, only what is going to be sold is produced.

"This model that we invented for fashion on demand is what has now positioned us as a

sustainable brand",

says the founder.

In the last four years, this form of business has begun to gain some popularity, but in 2019 it was unknown.

In Alohas they assure that they were pioneers: "We invented that model of our own brand on demand, I would say in the world. Yes, there were other companies that did 'preorder', but they were multi-brand stores that bought other things in 'preorder'".

They had to do communication work, both with the community and with the suppliers and even with the internal team.

Ankle boots with geometric drawings from Alohas.

Today they offer a hybrid model: "We believe that the best offer for the client is the combination of the two. After receiving the first purchases, we understand how each of the products will work. Those who are best sellers do a sales forecast and we will have them in stock in the future".

If an available design is purchased, it arrives home within a week.

If it is an on-demand proposal, the waiting time is extended to a month or a month and a half.

The name will be Hawaiian but the shoes are made in Elda, one of the municipalities with the longest shoemaking tradition in the Spanish Levant.

A part is also manufactured in Portugal.

Beyond footwear

The growth of the brand is not only reflected in social networks, where

its community increases daily

- "we have always wanted to be very close to the community, we count on them to make new designs, we are permanently in conversations", says Porras in this regard. - , but in the dimension of the project.

In 2021 they included clothing for the first time,

also made between Spain and Portugal.

The proposals, with obvious nods to trends, have worked so well that the idea is to give this category the same importance as footwear.

Alohas' clientele is between 25 and 35 years old and this age range has its equivalent in the collections, where it is easy to find simpler models and closer to the basic category (for example, high black boots), and options that are farther away of the foreseeable (two-tone ankle boots with a geometric pattern).

There is also no lack of alternatives for those who do not want animal skin designs, all of them included under the 'Vegan' category.

His famous clients

Celebrities such as the top

Kaia Gerber,

the singer

Nathy Peluso

or the model

Blanca Padilla,

in addition to an endless number of national and international influencers, have succumbed to the Alohas spirit, something that demonstrates the good reception of the brand among girls with very different styles. , something that allows them not to stick to a limited audience.

The prices of the shoes range between 100 and 250 euros.

According to the founder of the label, they have not made the designs more expensive due to inflation, as other brands in the fashion sector have done.

Currently, the company is based in Barcelona, ​​where it has 75 workers, but the truth is that 50% of sales come from the United States.

"40% Europe and 10% the rest of the world.

Much more is sold in the United States than in Spain,

which represents 6% of sales," the founder qualifies.

For now, last year closed with good figures and 2023 looks promising.

Will Alohas make the leap into the physical world with its own store?

Alejandro Porras says that "a pop up was held in Paris during fashion week that worked very well. This year we want to continue doing more pop ups and maybe even dare to open a permanent physical store."

You will have to follow their steps.

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