Kenya is known globally for producing middle and long distance runners that have dominated global track events and broken tens of records. However these athletes wear sports gear that are not made in Africa, well this is about to change.
Enda Sports founded in 2016 has however come up with solutions to this and athletes can now enjoy running in locally made shoes.
With a mission of bringing Kenyan athletic excellence to runners everywhere, Enda aims at ensuring that most upcoming athletes wear the running shoes for both training and competition.
Already four upcoming stars are using the footgear in local and international assignments. Suzie Chebet, Kenneth Kemboi, Jean Cherop and Alfred Moindi are just some of the second tier athletes.
The company recently launched its latest trainer running shoes christened ‘Lapatet’ (Kalenjin for running) and the company’s marketing manager Raphael Jani says that this will help get more athletes on board especially those who want quality running shoes.
"Our shoes are designed to maximize a midfoot strike and so that is a kind of style that is very popular in East Africa including Kenya and Ethiopia and so we make shoes that reward that strike. We are also unique because we are the first of our kind in Kenya and in Africa basically people who are making performance running footwear. It has not been done before."
“We are working with upcoming athletes to have an internal agreement with them to use our shoes for training and competition,” he said.
“This year we will be attempting to break another record as some of the athletes will be trying to get to the top of Mount Kenya in 7 hours,” he added.
In partnership with a factory in Kilifi known as Umoja Rubber Products Limited, they produce between 150 to 300 pairs of shoes per day In 2020, Enda sold 7,000 pairs of shoes thus marking a tenfold increase in sales compared to the year-end in 2019.
At the moment, 90% of their orders came from the United States showing growth in the brand's popularity in the country 8% from Europe and 12% from Kenya.
Enda now plans to launch a training shoe that is specifically designed for mountain running by the end of 2021.