Topic I know about: I worked for ECCO corporate for about 7 years, and have a pair of Ecco shoes I made myself. I no longer work there.
A well fit pair of ECCO’s can last multiple years. They genuinely do try and make quality shoes and there’s a lot of work done to keep the materials and manufacturing processes producing high quality shoes.
That being said, any shoe made with a polyurethane sole (like ECCO and most shoes nowadays) will not last for a lifetime. Polyurethane is a great material but not a lifetime material. The only shoes which could qualify as buy it for life material are ones with leather soles, but they require occasional resoleing, so are a ship of thesus sort of affair. A pair of ECCO's lasting 5 years is a reasonable goal but not one always attained.
You say you were wearing them everyday - this will decrease the overall lifetime of a pair of shoes. Your feet sweat and the inside gets wet, the leather uppers benefits from being allowed to dry out. Conversely, any shoes you own with polyurethane soles must be worn occasionally (a few times a year minimum) or the soles will harden and then crack and fall apart when being worn. ECCO used to get a lot of angry feedback from customers that bought expensive dress shoes only to wear to a wedding once a year, and they fell apart after only having been worn 2-4 times. You are best owning 2-4 pairs of shoes that you rotate through day to day, this will extend the life of all of them longer, so you will spend less overall (but need to start by buying multiple pairs). I would get pairs from different companies so you can compare how long they last and which you find are most comfortable for your feet. Some other companies that are in the same price and quality range as ECCO would be Cole Haan, Clarks, Timberland and Rockport. One of them might fit you much better then Vans or ECCO or whatever.
Finally, a good fit is key. If the shoe is too small, or just not the right shape for your foot, then whatever part of the shoe your foot is pushing against will wear out much faster then the rest of the shoe. This is actually a problem I have with ECCO’s personally. My feet are wide just behind my toes, and my shoes always fail right there where my foot is stretching the leather more then elsewhere, earlier then they would if they fit me better. Seeing how I was getting free and/or deeply discounted shoes, I was ok with this.
Shoe manufacturers use a form called a “last” when they manufacture shoes, the last determines the shape and fit of the shoe. Different companies have different lasts based on their own research and goals for fit and the kinds of customers they’re targeting. It may be that Van’s uses a last shape that doesn’t match up with your foot shape very well. Perhaps ECCO's will fit you well, perhaps not at all.
If you’re in the US, ECCO runs sales every other month or so when the already on-sale shoes will be discounted another 30-40% (I just looked and they're having one now...). You can pick up a pair for $100-150 pretty easily. Usually around holidays at a minimum. Keep an eye out on their website, and get a pair pretty cheap during a sale. Or, check out of there is an outlet near you, the outlets have legitimately low prices, especially on the clearance wall, though usually those shoes are also ugly AF which is how they end up there.
Anyone has questions about shoe production or ECCO, I’d be happy to answer. They make pretty good shoes and run their own, non sweatshop factories, so I do recommended the shoes. Their US office is run by a few complete idiots though so I don’t recommend working there.
