page_title: C. & J. Clark
section_title: Desert Boot
hierarchical_section_title: C. & J. Clark / Products / Desert Boot
caption_attribution_description: English: Picture of Clarks Desert Boot in Sand Suede. Uploaded May 2014.
context_page_description: C. & J. Clark International Ltd, trading as Clarks, is a British-based, international shoe manufacturer and retailer. It was founded in 1825 by brothers Cyrus and James Clark in Street, Somerset, England – where it still has its headquarters. The company has over 1,000 branded stores and franchises around the world and also sells through third-party distribution.
  For the year ending January 2013, the company made a profit of £150 million on sales of £1,433m making it the 31st largest private company in the United Kingdom. More than half of its £1.4bn annualised sales to January were generated abroad, and since 2010 the company has moved into India, where it now has 25 stand-alone stores, and relaunched marketing in China, where it has opened 400 outlets in partnership with local footwear retailers.
  It is 84% owned by the Clark family, with the remaining 16% held by employees and related institutions.
  The company is commonly known for its Desert Boot, a distinctive ankle height boot with crepe rubber sole, usually made out of calf suede leather traditionally supplied by Charles F Stead & Co tannery in Leeds.
context_section_description: The company's best known product is the Desert Boot – a distinctive ankle height boot with crepe sole usually made out of calf suede leather traditionally supplied by Charles F Stead & Co tannery in Leeds. Officially launched in 1950 the Desert Boot was designed by Nathan Clark (great-grandson of James Clark).
  Nathan Clark was an officer in the Royal Army Service Corps posted to Burma in 1941 with orders to help establish a supply route from Rangoon to the Chinese forces at Chongqing whilst also launching a series of offensives throughout South East Asia. Before leaving home his brother Bancroft had given him the mission to gather any information on footwear that might be of use to the company whilst he was travelling the world. The Desert Boot was the result of this mission.
  His discovery of the Desert Boot was made either at Staff College in 1944 or on leave in Kashmir where three divisions of the old Eighth Army (transferred to the Far East from North Africa) were wearing ankle high suede boots manufactured in the bazaars of Cairo. Nathan sent sketches and rough patterns back to Bancroft, but no trials were made until after he returned to Street and cut the patterns himself.
  The Desert Boot was cut on the men's Guernsey Sandal last and sampled in a neutral beige-grey 2mm chrome bend split suede. The company's Stock Committee reacted badly to the sample and dismissed the idea as it ‘would never sell’. It was only in his capacity as Overseas Development Manager that Nathan had any success with the shoe after introducing it to Oskar Schoefler (Fashion Editor, Esquire Magazine) at the Chicago Shoe Fair in 1949. He gave them substantial editorial credits with colour photographs in Esquire in early 1950. Bronson Davies subsequently saw these articles and applied to represent the company in selling them across the US, long before they were available in the UK. The Desert Boot was initially sold in Britain through shops in Regent Street, featuring a Union Jack sewn into the label, targeted at tourists. Lance Clark is widely credited with popularising them in Europe during the 1960s.
  The Desert Boot have been manufactured at Shepton Mallet, small scale production having initially occurred at Street. During the course of time, Whitecross factory in Weston-Super-Mare was subcontracted to relieve Shepton factory of the manufacture of the Desert Boot, before the Bushacre factory at Locking Road, Weston-Super-Mare was constructed in 1958. The Desert Boot was manufactured there until closure of the factory in 2001.
  Clarks announced in July 2017, it was restarting manufacturing Desert Boots, using a new manufacturing unit featuring "robot-assisted" technology, at its headquarters in Street, Somerset. Up to 300,000 pairs a year of desert boots were to be made at the unit, creating up to eighty technical and managerial jobs. However, in January 2019 the company announced that this unit was to be closed, after failing to meet production targets.
caption: The Clarks Desert Boot
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