"Alpargatas sí, libros no!” said Juan Domingo Perón in an appeal against universities’ elitism and expressing his favour for salt-of-the-earth blue collar work. This is what alpargatas, the ubiquitous Argentine take on the espadrille, have symbolised for almost two centuries.
Originally brought to Argentina by Basque immigrants from the Pyrenees mountains, the shoes quickly spread throughout the farming and rural communities. At the beginning of the 20th century a British company named Alpargatas adapted the espadrilles to Latin America by replacing the Jute rope soles with one made of rubber and modifying the toes. The shoes became a symbol of Argentina’s agricultural wealth, and eventually came to be worn with pride by chic city dwellers along with farmers.
The shoes have remained the same ever since the alpargatas company adapted the espadrille for the Latin American market. However, a fresh and energetic company has sprung up that is looking to launch alpargatas into a bit of a renaissance.
Three years ago, Tomás Pando and his business partner Francisco Murray started Paez Shoes. Pando found himself feeling restless at his job at a large company in Buenos Aires and left Argentina to travel through Europe and the US. He realised that these rich cultures were missing something very critical: the comfort and practicality offered by alpargatas. When he told his friend, Murray, his idea, it was originally ill received. But the two discussed the matter more and decided that not only was there a yawning market for alpargatasabroad, but that the original could do with a bit of sprucing up as well.
The aim of Paez Shoes is to produce alpargatas with fresh designs, quality materials, domestic production and a firm belief in honouring the shoe’s Argentine roots. They aim to spread their innovative take on the classic shoes across the globe.
The colours tend to be bright and lively without demanding attention, and the playful pattens are able to draw a surprising variety from such a no-frills canvas. Alpargatas are stitched with barely a handful of seams and the novel ornamentation from the design team at Paez is an example of ample creativity working within strict boundaries.
The young and irreverent spirit of the Paez is demonstrated best by their logo – the silhouette of two rabbits mating…maybe. It may be just one rabbit standing at attention, apparently behind the other but actually off in the distance, a dirty trick of perception.
“I tell my kids they’re just friends; that they’re just a couple of friendly rabbits sitting there together,” says US importer and licensee of Paez, Chris Johns. However, Pando sets the record straight by explaining that “we really wanted to stress the born and raised in Argentina aspect of the brand, it symbolises procreation. For the local market it’s sort of poking fun at the rural roots of alpargatas. For the abroad market, it’s saying that the brand was born and raised here, and it’s going to be spreading [with the vigor of rabbit reproduction] all over the world”.
The decision to keep production in Argentina is a defining element of the Paez brand, and one that was not easy for the founders. Alpargatas are usually produced in mass quantities. Pando mentioned that the leading brand produces a whopping 10,000 pairs of shoes every day. The key to most producer’s competitiveness is trimming expenses as much as possible, and the modifications and attention to detail which Paez Shoes require made it impossible for them to be made under such conditions. On the other-hand, the small manufacturing companies who Paez began by working with were unable to meet their requirements of producing with good materials and getting the international orders out on time. So, about a year and a half ago Paez opened their own small factory on the outskirts of Buenos Aires.
They began production just in time for the global financial collapse. Pando explains: “We had just opened and were employing a bunch of new people, and learning on the job and then from one day to the next our prospects were changing back and forth. So basically for the last year and a half the mission has been, ‘okay, let’s just survive this’.” And survive they have. If anything, their conviction to keep the production local, and be exposed to the turbulent Argentine economy, has been strengthened for having come through this difficult time intact.
And there must have been temptation to go the less painful route and set up production in a cheaper market, as Paez’s top competitor TOMS Shoes has done. TOMS also sells designer alpargatas abroad, mostly in the US, but they have a very different business model than Paez. TOMS was started by North American Blake Mycoskie after a trip to Argentina. For every pair of TOMS shoes bought, a pair is donated to a child in an impoverished community in Argentina. The company has become very successful and was quick to move production to China.
Peaz’s foreign partners stress that this celebration of alpargatas heritage is of the utmost importance to them and also naturally helps with marketing. Chris Johns explains: “Our first commitment is to the people in Argentina who are making these shoes and making sure that they’re in the best work environment, that they’re learning a skill and how to be creative and that we’re able to carry on a tradition that people in Argentina have loved for decades and decades.” Paez also stresses environmental responsibility and the shoes come in bags made entirely from recycled materials and created with diverse uses in mind.
It appears that Paez’s mission of responsible production and spreading of this Argentine classic is being well received by interested partners in foreign markets. From it’s inception there has been a prominent announcement on the company’s website that informs intrigued readers as to how they can get involved with bringing Paez to their countries. Pando explains the business model as such: “We’re trying to build a big network of entrepreneurs, small, independent business people who are interested in working with something new. Our philosophy is to work with people that can replicate what we’re doing here in each country. It’s a long term project, in which both sides will learn from each other.”
The model seems to be working as sales have been steadily increasing both in Argentina and abroad every year since the company’s founding. In the US, for example, the number of Paez has been growing like little baby rabbits. In the last year Johns has gone from having shipments in the hundreds sent up to supply smaller retailers to the factory in Buenos Aires having just completed his first large order of 5,000 pairs which will be sold online and to large retail stores. Just last month he received a commitment to 12,000 pairs.
Similar expansion is also occurring with other foreign Paez representatives who span across 20 different countries and five continents. Procreation indeed.
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