Why leather matters to New Balance
Athletic footwear brand New Balance has shared details of its leather consumption. The Boston-based company bought part of Wolverine Leathers, the in-house leather supply division of the Wolverine Worldwide group, in September.
Wolverine ran its own tannery in Rockford, Michigan, for 100 years, but production there ended in 2009. After that, Wolverine Leathers remained an active part of the group, contracting leather production and leather colouring to suppliers in five locations in the US, Vietnam, Thailand and China.
As part of a wider cost-cutting programme, Wolverine announced in December 2022 that it would let go of the leather business. New Balance bought the US part of it for $6 million.
Speaking at the science-based talks at Lineapelle in Milan in February, a senior executive specialising in sustainability at New Balance, Katy O’Brien, said the company currently makes around 100 million pairs of shoes and boots per year.
Not all of these products are made from leather, but she said New Balance’s leather consumption currently stood at 60 million square-feet of finished leather per year.
As part of the acquisition of the US part of its leather business, Wolverine “assigned its US tannery contracts” to New Balance. This will help the athletic footwear company secure the supply of the quality and quantity of leather it needs.
