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FASHION & CONSUMER DEMAND
36
WORLD FOOTWEAR | MAY/JUNE 2012
G
aitonde is a name with great renown, not just in
India, but in the international footwear industry.
The story begins in the 1920s, when the Gaitonde
family carved out an important niche for itself as
an agent in India for tanners from the UK. The important port
city of Kochi in the state of Kerala in the far south of India was
the company’s original base because it offered a good
transport link to Europe; it brought hides and skins from the
UK into the port and sold them on to tanners in India for
processing or finishing. When the port of Chennai opened in
the neighbouring state of Tamil Nadu, the Gaitonde business
moved there.
A significant development came in 1968 when Raghu
(universally known as R.Y.) Gaitonde took over the agency
from his father. Soon afterwards, an industry contact from
Europe offered footwear manufacturing machinery including
stitching machines and he decided to take the business in a
new direction, by using the raw material himself to make
finished products. “By 1994 we had three tanneries and
seven factories of our own,” explains the current head of
operations, Vivek Gaitonde, nephew of Raghu and grandson
of the founder, “making uppers, finished footwear,
leathergoods, the entire gamut.”
Own brand
This output was as an outsource manufacturing partner of
European brands, including Christian Dior, Bally, Clarks (and
its K Shoes brand) and Gabor. But in 1994, Raghu Gaitonde
thought that if his company was able to make shoes of a
sufficiently high quality to sell for high prices in European
shops, he might as well create his own brand to
sell, at least in the Indian market. Sales in the
first two years were “average” according
to the current operations manager. “But
then we realised that feet are different
in India,” he adds. “So we sent two
members of our design team to Italy
to train and come back to adapt our
designs for Indian feet. We studied
Indian feet and came up with
different fittings and different
tooling.”
He explains that many Indian men
reach their mid-teens before
acquiring their first “proper” pair of
shoes and even then spend much of
their time indoors in bare feet. As a
result, they tend to have splayed toes. “People loved our
fitting and have kept the same pair of our shoes for years,
only coming in to have us re-sole them.”
Gaitonde shoes are based on classic English styles, which
is in keeping with the preference of its customers, the
company believes. Vivek Gaitonde says: “Between 1996
and about 2001 we ruled the market. The joke here was
that the typical gift for a son-in-law at the time of his
marriage was a pair of Gaitonde shoes.” During this period,
the company set up five exclusive showrooms, in Chennai,
Bangalore, Hyderabad, Mumbai and Kochi; the retail
footprint was concentrated in the south and west of India.
“People in this part of India are more brand loyal and brand
conscious,” he explains. “People in the north can be very
stylish, and there are excellent men’s shoe stores in every
major city in India, but they tend to buy a pair of shoes
because they are stylish and expensive and without much
loyalty to any brand.” In addition to its own stores, it worked
with seven distributors to have Gaitonde shoes in other
retail outlets.
Recovery time
In 2000, Raghu Gaitonde died suddenly and the
business, understandably perhaps, took time to recover.
Between 2003 and 2007 it pulled back from having
Only the best will do
Chennai-based footwear brand Gaitonde has gone through various phases in its
development. Now, based on a complete commitment to the finest quality raw
materials and technological innovation, it is poised to re-invent itself once again,
this time as a provider of luxury, exclusive, tailor-made gentlemen’s shoes.