Locals Hawaiian Pink Stripe Slipper on Sale Now!

While we wait patiently for summer’s arrival, we’re doing our best to help everyone make it through the long days of these winter months. Help us help you spread the love by picking up some slick and holiday-appropriate Locals Pink Stripe Slippers for that deserving Valentine in your life. Locals Hawaiian flip flops (as some call them; we prefer ‘slippahs’) were built for fun, and what’s more fun than this February season of love?

The 20% off Locals Slippers sale is currently running (for a short time!) for both womens and kids Locals slaps sizing categories. (Sorry men.) There is no promotional or coupon code needed; the Locals Pink Stripe Slipper product is listed as discounted on its different product pages.

That’s all for now. Spread the love and share this Locals Slippers blog post with your friends using the share icons below ↓↓ !

Valentine’s Mahalos!

~The Team

Locals Massage Slippers (“Slippas with Da Bumps”) Now Available Online!

A question we were getting from a lot of fans was “Eh braddah, you got the slippas with da bumps that massage your feet while you walk?!” And the answer to that question now is, “Why yes. Yes we do.” This January of 2013, we here at Locals USA added 4 colorways of the Locals Massage Slippas to our official Locals online store in the Men’s and Women’s categories. Kids Locals Massage Slippers will be coming soon, but for now, the originals are up and ready for your spring and summer walkabouts!

These slippers combine the original styling of the OG Locals Strap Slippers, but with an amazing added massage effect. The bumps are relatively hard rubber and are made of the same materials as the base (or footbed) of the Strap Slipper models. As you walk, the bumps press against your foot in an intermittent manner, which gives it the massage effect. These slippers really do provide additional comfort! One suggestion is to make sure your Locals Massage Slippers aren’t too small for you; this will ensure a comfortable fit between the strap and the bumps of the footbed for your foot.

We are also planning to add more styles to the Kids and Youth section very soon, so continue to stay tuned here to our official Locals blog to see what’s coming up next. We are starting to get stoked for the summer and hope that you are too! Until then, know that you can always buy Locals Slippers online here. Mahalos!

~The Locals USA Team

We’re stoked for the 2012 holiday season, and we thought we’d share the love by hooking you - our loyal Locals family – up with some of that good feeling. When you cruise over to our official online store and you’re browsing around for the whole fam, be sure to enter coupon code Aloha12, which will hook you up with 15% off your entire order. In addition, we’ve loaded the cart to set you up with free shipping on all orders over $50. What all that means is that you can save a grip, get a bunch of fresh and authentic Hawaiian slippahs, and help us spread Aloha…all at once!

And as of today (Dec 11), we have updated our stock, so we are fully loaded for all your holiday needs!

We appreciate all that you do for us, and we wish you an amazing holiday season. Mele Kalikimaka from your friends at Locals!

~ The Team

P.S. Have you liked our Locals Facebook page yet? Well, have you tweeted our Twitter?!

Aloha friends!

We are super stoked to announce that the Kids & Youth Locals Slippers are now available on our web store – cheeeeee! This is a huge addition to our online offering, and we hope that you agree and pick some up for the little ones in your life! We pretty much shrunk down all of the da kine Locals Originals to to size for all the fashionable little keiki out there! These are perhaps our favorite slippers to get out because what better way to Spread Aloha and bring the Hawaiian Locals style forward than through styling out the little ones?! And style they will! Here is a sample pic of our Summer Candy model, reserved especially for little wahines with spunk!

We also invite and encourage all of you guys to Like our Facebook page! We’ve added a ton of cool features to the page, and we just launched our Summer Slipper Giveaway. Who doesn’t like free slippers?! Not only will we be giving away Locals Slippers throughout the rest of the summer, we’ve also included a Locals Slippers discount code available only to our Facebook fans. We’ll soon be adding photo contests and other really cool features, so make sure you jump on board and Like us so that you don’t miss out!

Please do us a huge solid and share this post with your friends using the share buttons below ↓. We are really stoked about bringing the Kids & Youth Locals to our online store, and we think others will be as well, so please help us spread the word!

If you are thinking about getting some Locals Hawaiian Slippers for your kids, note that we are still running the free shipping promo on any and all orders over $50, so you can style out the whole fam and get free shipping while you’re at it! Enjoy!

Super Mahalos, everyone!

~Official Locals Hawaiian Slippers Team

We are super stoked for an awesome start to the summer here in sunny southern California! June gloom? Not even! We hope that you are all enjoying your summer no matter where you are. It is one thing we Americans pretty much all have in common; summer = fun!

If you find yourself in need of the perfect pair of slippers for your BBQ’s, surf getaways, or pool parties, we wanted to let you know that we’ve totally amped our inventory. We stocked up on everything, so get your order in now while the selection is ripe!

And if you’re like me and you lagged a little too much on getting your dad something really awesome for Father’s Day, why not get him a pair or two of Locals? Sure it’s late, and they might arrive next week, but I can assure you that a pair of Locals a few days late is better than nothing. That is a fact!

We really appreciate your support and love for Locals, and please know that we are here to serve you. If there is anything we can do to help out, don’t hesitate to contact us here. And please share with your friends using the buttons below or by sharing on Facebook or Twitter. They will love you for it.

Oh, and we are still running the free shipping on orders over $50 promo for now, so stock up while that’s still out there!

Summer Mahalos, everyone!

-The Locals USA Team

P.S. If you have a retail shop and the shop is really cool and you really want to sell Locals, give us a shout by filling out the form on our Locals Wholesale page.

Spring has officially hatched, and we just picked up some fresh stock of Locals Slippers, straight from Hawaii. We now have enough for you, your friend and your surfing dog…so drop by the store and check out what we’ve got! If there are any special requests or comments, as always, we invite you to email us using our Contact Form.

And to address a question that we’ve gotten a few times…we WILL be adding kids’ sizes very soon. The next time we send out a blog update it will be with kids’ Locals being in stock – something we are super stoked about!

Feel free to share this message using the icons below ↓, and while you’re at it, be our friend on Facebook and Twitter, why don’t ya? We are amped to be bringing the good news of Locals Ohana to the mainland and to be spreading aloha in 2012! Mahalos for making it possible!

- The Locals USA Team

Many Mahalos!

~ The Locals USA Team

In December of 2011, Hana Hou!, the official magazine of Hawaiian Airlines published a piece on the history of the slippah in Hawaii (full article can be read here.) They open the article with the following:

“Hawai‘i does not wear flip-flops. This might be news to you if you’re from the Mainland, but it’s true. Hawai‘i does not wear thongs, either, at least not on its feet. It does not wear jandals, as they do in New Zealand, and it does not wear slipslops, as they do in South Africa…Nor does it wear flip-flaps, flips, slaps or anything like that…What Hawai‘i wears, and what the rest of the world calls by so many other names, is the rubber slipper—or even more correctly, the rubbah slippah.” They go on to state, “The name is important because the slipper is important.”

Meaning & Uses of The Rubbah Slippah

Indeed, the rubber slippah is an iconic piece of the collective Hawaiian soul, and it serves to symbolize the chill and laid-back atmosphere Hawaii is famous for. It also represents the practicality and humility of its residents. The Hawaiian people aren’t boastful or proud, but rather an intently minimalist people. The slipper is all that’s needed. And its iconic symbol shows up everywhere – from paintings and tattoo designs to metal pendants and earrings available at nearly every jewelery shop.

Not only that, but the slipper is incredibly useful. Hawaiians use the slipper for kickball bases, stabilizing rocky tables, killing cockroaches (it’s true!) and even for bodysurfing. Bodysurfers have been known to use the slipper as an extension of the hand to plane against the breaking wave when either no board is available or the surfer decides his luck was better with a slipper.

Even though slipper manufacturing has largely moved outside of Hawaii, there are several brands (Locals not being the least of which) that are Hawaii-based and continue to shape the world of the popularity-gaining slipper.

Black Rubber Sandals Flip Flops

Although minimalist footwear that resembled the flip flop, sandal or slippah (as we know them today) can be traced all the way back to BC times when foot coverings (a more apt term) where made of rawhide and papyrus, the rubber slipper as beach wear (and then ultimately fashion wear) began its journey in Japan in the 1920′s.

The first term used for the traditional Y-shaped thong sandal comes from the Japanase word zori (which is also where the manufacturer of Locals Slippahs – Zori Zori – gets its name). The traditional zori was a woven-type of sandal that was used as beach footwear in Japan and the rest of the South Pacific in order to maximize comfort when walking through the sand in addition to minimizing clean-up. The Japanese were smart; getting sand out of shoes is the worst, and they realized it first!

It is suggested (but also slightly contested) that an English businessman by the name of John Cowie created a plastic version of the traditional zori and can also be credited with the creation of the word jandal, a combo of the words Japanese + Sandal. Cowie’s family moved to New Zealand, the country that can be credited with really starting the global desire for plastic or rubber sandals. NZ was the first country to start buying, wearing and ultimately producing sandals, starting in the 1950′s and 60′s.

Wikipedia provides us with an interesting story (original text here) that suggests that the US Troops in the 1850′s may have, in fact, been the first to ever wear flip flops (as we know them today). Although unsubstantiated, the following quotes from a letter to the editor of the New York Times regarding the ill-prepared troops suggest they were sporting this type of footwear: “The men were not in uniform, but very poorly dressed, — in many cases with flip-flap shoes…The men have not yet been supplied with shoes, and yet still march flip-flop. Why?” Cool, right?

World-Wide Popularity of the Rubber Slippah

Flip-flops are a common type of footwear throughout the world. They are immensely popular in both developed and developing countries. In countries like Australia, USA, Brazil and India, people wear rubber flip flops out of convenience in addition to style. In most developing countries throughout the world, however, people wear flip flops out of necessity, as they are the cheapest type of foot coverings available.

The rubber sandal and the Hawaiian Aloha have been inseparable dating back to when the Japanese first brought them over to the islands of Hawaii in the 1940′s. More about the link between Hawaii and the rubber slippah here.