To demonstrate that running with the Kalenji brand is about pleasure and reward - not pain and sacrifice - we collaborated with a Michelin restaurant trained chef, Kosuke Tada, to create a menu where you paid for your meal with kilometres instead of cash. Invitations, in the form of menus, were incorporated into a range of special edition shoe boxes. Runners were activated to run in their new Kalenji shoes, accumulate kilometres, and then come and spend them in the restaurant. We also created a range of gourmet products that runners could buy with their kilometres.

We took over an existing restaurant in Paris for two days. In collaboration with Michelin trained Parisian chef Kosuke Tada, we designed a three course menu that definitely didn’t shy away from enjoyable, satisfying ingredients such as butter and cream. To pay for their meals, guests showed their cumulation of kilometres on their running app. Data from all running apps was accepted.

The event took place at the end of April 2016 so concrete results are still being collected at the time of writing. What we know so far : we had more reservations than we were able to serve. More than 3000 kilometres were ‘spent’ at the restaurant in total. After success of this event, plans to develop a follow up concept at the time of the Paris marathon.

We created Eat Your Run, a pop up restaurant where diners paid in kilometres instead of cash. Through menus and invitations printed inside shoe boxes, we activated people to run their new ELIORUN shoes and accumulate kilometres to spend on meals at the restaurant.

For many runners, running is connected to diet. They go for a run, look at the amount of calories burned and say to themselves, if I eat a cheeseburger now, I’m back to zero and my run is wasted! Our strategy was to take the opposite approach. To say to people: what’s the point of running if you can’t indulge in a great meal afterwards? Another part of our strategy was the fun hijack of data on running apps. Many runners collect data these days, and there are many great apps for doing so. The data collected helps runners improve their performance, and strive to run faster, harder, better. But Kalenji is more about getting out and running for fun with friends. So our strategy was to hijack that data and put it to another use – as currency in our restaurant.

Kalenji is a French brand who make accessibly priced running shoes. Many other running shoe brands associate running with performance, sacrifice, and constant self improvement. But Kalenji want to stake out a territory associated with pleasure. They believe that running is not a religion, but a pleasurable part of a balanced life, and that running should be accessible to everyone. Instead of advocating a ‘live to run’ lifestyle, Kalenji preach ‘run to live’.