Mind going into shoe autism so us plebs can see the difference?
The Japanese make them from better materials that are Japanese in origin, and then have Japanese people make them.
They are made out of sturdier canvas, and don't have the stupid felt on the bottom, because the Japanese love their Chucks, and won't stand for what we get here. They get way more custom colors and options as well.
Converse Japan was started in 2003 when a Japanese textile firm bought the rights to make Converse shoes in Japan when Converse went bankrupt, before Nike (or during) bought them out.
Japanese market Chucks that are not made in Japan are made in Indonesia instead of Vietnam. I don't think there is much difference between those and the US market Chucks aside from the felt on the bottom, because the yellow jews who run Japan don't have a "slipper" loophole to import shoes as slippers for less because they have felt on a certain percentage of the bottom of the sole. This naturally gives them much better traction on things like say, a basketball court. or more realistically, any smooth flooring surface found anywhere indoors without carpet.
With the shoes I posted:
The black/white shoe is a shoe that I purchased a couple of years ago, the red shoe I received today, directly from Converse.
With the red shoe, Nike removed the internal reinforcements at the forefoot, removed the heel counter guard, changed the interior lining, and then even cheapened out on the insole, replacing the blown rubber shock absorbtion portion with EVA foam. And to top it off, they started importing them with felt on the soles, when they originally did not. This allows Nike to duck a shoe tariff and import them as slippers, which has a lower tariff.
They did all of this to cut pennies out of a shoe that is probably less than a dollar to make, and still have the balls to charge $90 per pair.
This of course, only applies to the Chuck Taylors sold in the US, the rest of the planet gets them without felt on the bottom, as I imagine the process to do so actually increases the cost of the shoe a bit (which is then offset by the cheaper import tariff, pending whatever Trump did, lul).
Vans, to their credit, does not do this.
Edit: With God as my witness, I will HAPPILY pay $150 for a pair of canvas shoes that are MADE IN JAPAN vs $90 made by inferior chinks who use slave labor. I've watched myself do this for my G-Shock Squares, and goddammit, I'm gonna do it again, for shoes.
