The self-called 'shoe blogger', Manolo Blahnik, proves that a blog doesn't have to be informative (or useful) to be immensely popular. Manolo's Shoe Blog has a devoted following, a large proportion of which are Gen-Y females who are brand new to the world of blogs. In fact, Manolo's blog is so popular that it's dwarfing the notoriety he reached by his (or, more accurately, his shoes') many appearances on the soles of Sex and the City's fashion-savvy starlets.
I first heard about the blog in the most unlikely of places. In the line at Starbucks a couple weeks ago two girls behind me in line were chatting about shoes, and one of them dropped the the name of the shoe blogger. The other girl gasped, jumped up and down (I know this because her purse swung out and hit me in the back), and gushed "Oh my gosh, I am just SO addicted." Naturally, I checked it out as soon as I got home. I am officially hooked too.
Perhaps the most fun part of Manolo's blog is the "Gallery of the Horrors" featuring all sorts of hideous and hilarious shoes. Also fun is the "whose shoes" guessing game, which offers daily posts of celebrity soles for readers to guess at. (The answers are then posted the following day)
But the shoe blogger isn't just infamous amongst young women. "When someone writes the history of blogs, there'll be a special chapter devoted to the one the call 'the Manolo," writes Guy Brighton of Fashion magazine.
Some say he's a pioneer, and his main achievement is tapping into a demographic that has been slow to catch on to the blogging phenomenon. But perhaps he's just a smart businessman, for Manolo sales are higher than ever.
