Foot Dicks

I am the last person on Earth who should have any input on the topic of fashion. Nearly everything I wear is old. And not clever old like I found it in my grandma’s closet and I want to make a statement. I have just been wearing the same pants and shirts for the past decade. I care very little about my outward appearance. I regard clothing as a uniform that I must wear because society says I can’t walk around nude. The uniform I wear is black slacks, white t-shirt, black shoes. My only flare comes in the form of my socks. I have always enjoyed a loud, zany sock. Lucky for me, my friend Ryan Kingman cofounded Stance Socks, a brand almost completely dedicated to top-quality wacky socks. Ryan left his long-term position at Element Skateboards and his reputation for brutally knocking out a fair share of fringe skateboarding riffraff to become Stance’s VP of marketing to take on the dangerous world of sock manufacturing head-on. And more important, he sent me my first new socks in ten years. Vice: Why the sock business?
Ryan Kingman: Are you kidding me? Why not? Everything else has been done to death. There’s 100 brands of everything. We focus on a category that has been largely commoditized and give it a sense of individuality, freedom, and expression. Goal of the brand?
You know, really knock your socks off. Put the planet Earth in a sock and give the rest of the universe a “sock party” beating like they did Gomer Pyle in Full Metal Jacket. Same goes for any sock-blockers out there. Foot fetish is really big, Ryan. Have you considered making a flesh-colored sock that looks like a penis?
Most socks sort of have a phallic shape to them. But I mean really do it up with drawn-on pubes and dickhead. Maybe ball tassels that hang off the top?
No, but I bet we could have some fun with that one. Put a big hairy scrotum at the top and a penis head on the tip. A veiny shaft on the shins. You could make black socks that go all the way up to your thighs!
I think we might want to stop before we give away too many ideas. Do you have a foot fetish?
I don’t. We did this program at a recent tradeshow event called Happy Ending where we took people’s old socks and swapped them for new ones and gave the people a massage. The old socks were then washed and given to the homeless. Seeing the whole process and watching people unsheath their ugly, stinky feet was pretty gnarly. It sounded really good in theory until you’re looking at this big box of dirty socks. Why do so many socks go limp and have to get thrown away? What causes that?
I don’t know, that’s the other brands, the shitty ones. Ours won’t go limp. Ours are strong, hard, phallic socks. We hate the quitters. It comes down to the materials. Most socks are a cotton/nylon/spandex/polyester blend, and it’s important to come up with just the right blend to avoid having quitters. Ours are combed-cotton/poly blend and if you nail that you can have a great sock that will last a long time. But it also depends on what kind of activities you’re doing. If you’re jumping rope for 15 hours a day your socks are probably going to fall down. Where do the mates of my socks keep disappearing to and have you thought of a way to stop this from happening?
I’m not sure where they go, probably one of those singles conventions where everyone goes on a cruise and they all hump each other. There’s probably a sock version of that in some alternate universe. But yeah, we have a few things to combat that. We have “Mix Match”: two socks that don’t match when you get them. We also have “Three of a Kind”: three single socks that don’t match. And “Swinging Singles,” where we sell just single socks. We’re building a brand based on the problem of your washing machine eating your socks: don’t match, don’t matter. Have you considered making a sock for the prison crowd, where it’s lined to feel like a pocket pussy?
No, but I have been approached by numerous ex-convicts suggesting that we make prison-specific socks that have a split toe. Most dudes in prison wear socks with slippers and it’s a running complaint about socks not being form-fit for slippers. There’s something wrong with our jail system if the fit of their socks are prisoners’ biggest complaint.
I don’t think it’s their biggest complaint. They have a lot of shit to complain about and that just happens to be on the list. For more info on socks, go to Stance.com.