When we started RYVYN, the idea was actually pretty simple.
We liked what minimalist footwear was designed to do. More room for your toes, a flexible sole, zero drop, and less structure between your feet and the ground all made sense to us.
What we struggled with was finding shoes that combined those characteristics with the kind of everyday sneaker styling we actually wanted to wear.
That became the starting point for RYVYN.
Minimalist footwear without the “barefoot shoe” look
There are some fantastic minimalist footwear brands around the world, and the category has grown enormously.
But we felt there was still a gap.
A lot of people are interested in wearing shoes that allow their feet more freedom to move, but don’t necessarily want their footwear to look particularly different.
We wanted something you could put on with jeans, shorts, or whatever you’d normally wear and not really think about it.
A normal-looking everyday sneaker, just built differently.
That’s where our original idea came from:
Looks like an everyday sneaker. Moves like a minimalist shoe.
It still sums up what we’re trying to build better than anything else.
Why start an Australian brand?
We’re based in the Perth Hills in Western Australia, and when we began looking more seriously at the minimalist footwear market, another thing stood out: many of the established options available to Australians were coming from overseas.
That isn’t necessarily a problem, but we saw an opportunity to create a local option.
A small Australian business where the people responding to an email are the same people developing the products, packing the orders, talking to customers, and deciding what comes next.
RYVYN is designed here in Australia and manufactured in China by a specialist footwear manufacturer with more than 15 years of experience producing minimalist footwear.
For us, that combination made sense. It gave us access to the specialist manufacturing experience we needed, while allowing us to build the brand, products, and customer experience here in Australia.
We wanted minimalist footwear to feel approachable
We also didn’t want RYVYN to feel like footwear only for people who were already deeply involved in barefoot or minimalist movement.
I’m interested in movement and running, and Karolina is a physiotherapist, so we’ve naturally spent a lot of time thinking and talking about the way people move.
But you shouldn’t need to be an expert in biomechanics to buy a pair of shoes.
Our aim was to make RYVYN approachable whether you’ve worn minimalist footwear for years or you’re simply curious about trying something different.
That’s one of the reasons our shoes can be worn with or without their removable insoles.
Keep the insole in and you get a little more softness underfoot.
Take it out and you get more internal space and a more minimal, connected feel.
Neither option is “correct”. It’s about finding what feels right for you.
Starting with four shoes
We could have tried to launch with a huge range of colours and styles.
Instead, we decided to start relatively small.
ARC, INK, SOL, and VUE are our first four models, and we’re using this initial range to learn what people actually want rather than assuming we already know.
Since launching, some of the most valuable information we’ve received hasn’t come from spreadsheets or advertising reports. It’s come from conversations with customers.
Which colours people gravitate towards.
How different feet fit the shoes.
Whether people prefer wearing the insoles in or out.
What people new to minimalist footwear are unsure about.
And what experienced minimalist wearers wish was easier to find.
Taking RYVYN to the Sydney Barefoot Shoe & Foot Health Expo was another big part of that learning process. Having people pick the shoes up, try them on, walk around in them, and tell us exactly what they thought was incredibly useful.
Some of the feedback that stuck with us most was also some of the simplest: people liked that the shoes looked like normal sneakers.
That told us the original idea still mattered.
We’re still at the beginning
RYVYN is a young brand, and we’re not pretending otherwise.
We’re starting with four models, listening closely, learning quickly, and trying to improve as we go.
There are plenty of things we’d eventually like to add — new colours, new styles, additional sizes, and, further down the track, potentially footwear for kids.
But we don’t want to grow the range simply for the sake of having more products.
We want what comes next to be shaped by what our customers actually want from us.
That’s also one of the reasons we’re starting this blog.
Some posts will be about minimalist footwear and the questions we get from customers. Karolina will be able to bring her physiotherapy background into some of those topics.
Others might be about our shoes, product development, things we’ve learned building RYVYN, events we’ve attended, new products, or simply what’s happening behind the scenes.
We want this to be somewhere we can share more than can fit into an Instagram caption or product page.
Where we’re trying to go
We’re not interested in telling people that everyone needs to wear minimalist shoes or that there’s only one correct way to choose footwear.
We simply believe there should be more good everyday options for people who want their feet to have room to move naturally.
And we think those shoes can still look great.
That’s what we’re trying to build with RYVYN.
Thanks for being here at the beginning.
Iain
Co-founder, RYVYN