I wrote yesterday about the Hoka running shoe: ugly but now widely popular and highly successful. $1.4 billion in sales last year. I compared their reception to some people’s response to Jesus: “Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?”

There’s one more thing striking from the Wall Street Journal article about Hokas: also, like Jesus, Hokas started small and intentionally grew slowly.

“It’s easy when you’re hot like this to let anybody buy what they want to buy, but that’s the fastest way to ruin a brand,” said Matt Powell, a longtime analyst of the sneaker industry. “The short-term gains are the easiest ones to get. It’s the long-term gains that make you a successful brand.” (emphasis mine)

To grow fast, think slow. That’s the business lesson in every box of Hokas. The way to stay hot is to stoke the fire, not to douse it with gasoline. – Ben Cohen, Wall Street Journal, June 22, 2023

“To grow fast, think slow.” That will preach.

And he went up on the mountain and called to him those whom he desired, and they came to him. And he appointed twelve (whom he also named apostles) so that they might be with him and he might send them out to preach… (Mark 3.13, 14, ESV)

Jesus chose 12 to be “with him” and then “sent out.”

The 120 people in the Upper Room (see Acts 1.12 – 15) became half the Roman Empire by the year 300. How? By growing slowly. Please see my blog post What Changes the World? The main point of that post is this:

The world has been changed, not by spreading ideas through the masses but by committed Jesus followers, living out the Gospel in the power of the Holy Spirit. – The Ewellogy, May 3, 2022

You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet. You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven. (Matthew 5.13 – 16, ESV)