> (apparently they make left and right shoes in different countries now)

This feels like a joke about just in time inventory and globalization, but I'm worried that it might be true.

I'm not immune. I recently bought some New Balance shoes from Sheels, figuring I'd be getting reasonable quality footwear. Both sets had hole damn near worn through the soles and delamination in multiple locations after ~6 months of wearing them as an office worker who does no abnormal amount of walking or exercise in them. Come to find out their "non flagship" models are cheaply made garbage as opposed to the quintessential white leather model that costs, iirc, the upper $300 range and is made in America.

A more likely scenario is that display shoes of the same nominal size/model can be made in different factories, and when they are reboxed to be sold, they end up in a box from the wrong factory. Different factories make the same model but can have differences in processes so the shoes are noticeably different. Having left and right made in separate factories, much less countries, would be a total nightmare of inventory management.

Enshittification is only going to get worse just like everything else.

> if forced to choose blindly I'd pick Sony over WMFSENSY.

Only at the same price. If there's a big discount, I'm going to prefer the random letter jumble from China because it's probably a standard design that a lot of factories are producing because it works well enough.

The only reason I lean towards Sony all things being equal is because I know that Sony gets sued when things go wrong, and won't just drop the brand and close up shop like the random letter jumble.

Also I would prefer Sony if lead would be a problem somewhere in the thing I'm buying.

To be fair mentioning Nike is kind of a straw man here — unless being explicit with the model/style. They manufacturer to many different price points, more than an auto maker.