| Type | Private company |
|---|---|
| Industry | Clothing and Sports equipment |
| Founded | 1894 |
| Headquarters | Lausanne, Switzerland |
| Area served | Worldwide |
| Products | Footwear, sportswear, sports equipment, toiletries |
| Website | www.bata.com |
Bata Shoes (Czech: Baťa or Baťovy závody) is a large, family owned shoe company based in Bermuda but currently headquartered in Lausanne, Switzerland, operating 3 business units worldwide – Bata Metro Markets, Bata Emerging Markets and Bata Branded Business. It has a retail presence in over 50 countries and production facilities in 26 countries. In its history the company has sold more than 14 billion pairs of shoes.
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The company was founded in 1894 Zlín (then Austro-Hungarian Empire, today the Czech Republic) by Tomáš Baťa (Czech pronunciation: [ˈtomaːʃ ˈbaca]), whose family had been cobblers for generations. A large order from the army, military shoes and rising demand for them, during World War I started rapid growth and small manufacture turned into modern industrial concern, one of the first mass producers of shoes.
Tomáš Baťa was recognised for his social consciousness, establishing housing, cinemas and advancement programmes for his employees. The phrase "work collectively, live individually" is one of his sayings. Baťa recognised the potential of large-scale production, and was often called the "Henry Ford of Eastern Europe". He saw technology as a means of progress, and wanted to make the shoes as cheaply as possible so that the greatest number of people could access them
In 1932 Tomáš died in a plane crash at the age of 56 at the Zlín Airport (attempting to take off under bad weather conditions) and his half-brother Jan Antonín Baťa became head of the company.
At the time of Tomáš's death, the Baťa company employed 16,560 people, maintained 1,645 shops and 25 enterprises. Most of what Tomáš had built was centralised in Bohemia-Moravia (15,770 employees, 1,500 shops, 25 enterprises) and Slovakia (250 employees and 2 enterprises). The total international contribution to the Baťa organisation at the time of Tomas's death consisted of 20 international enterprises, 132 shops and 790 employees.
Under Jan Antonín Baťa the company grew quickly and continued its expansion throughout Europe, North America, Asia and North Africa. Zlín accommodated the largest part of the company, with manufacturing and headquarters.
Apart from shoes, Baťa also diversified into other areas (tyres, toys, plastic fibres, etc.).
Jan Baťa expanded the Bohemian and Moravian part of the business, more than doubling its size to 38,000 employees, 2,200 shops and 70 enterprises. In Slovakia, the business grew from 250 employees to 12,340 and 8 enterprises.
In the face of a worldwide depression, Jan Baťa, following the plans laid down by Tomas Bata before his death, expanded the company more than six times its original size throughout Czechoslovakia and the world. From the time of his brother's death, in 1932, to 1942, he grew the Baťa organisation to 105,770 employees.
During the 1930s, imports from Czechoslovakia ultimately became too expensive, due to the economic crisis in Europe at the time. Jan Antonín also established subsidiaries in several foreign countries (for example in Brazil and Britain). Following the overseas expansion, Bata owned executive aircraft to transport managers between the various company locations.
Company policy initiated under Tomas Bata was to set up villages around the factories for the workers and to supply schools and welfare.
These villages include Batadorp in the Netherlands, Baťovany (present-day Partizánske) and Svit in Slovakia, Baťov (nowadays Bahňák, part of Otrokovice) in the Czech Republic, Borovo-Bata (nowadays Borovo Naselje, part of Vukovar in Croatia then in Kingdom of Yugoslavia), Bataville in Lorraine, France, Batawa in Canada, East Tilbury[1] in Essex, England, Batapur in Pakistan and Batanagar and Bataganj in India. There was also a Bata shoe factory in Maryland, USA, northeast of Baltimore, that was next to U.S. Route 40. This town was named Belcamp http://www.kilduffs.com/BATA.html.
The company, which established itself in India in 1931, started manufacturing shoes in Batanagar in 1936.
In 1922, the first Bata shop abroad opened in the Netherlands; in 1933, construction began on the Bata shoe factory in Best, in the Dutch province of Brabant, at the intersection of the railway tracks leading to Eindhoven and the Wilhelmina Canal located nearby. There was an abundance of inexpensive and hard-working labourers in the Brabant countryside.
The British "Bata-ville" in East Tilbury inspired the documentary Bata-ville: We Are Not Afraid of the Future.
After Germany occupied the rest of pre-war Czechoslovakia (15 March 1939) Jan Antonín Baťa, who left the country with his family after a brief time in jail after the Nazi occupation, tried to save as much as possible, submitting to the plans of Germany as well as supporting financially the Czechoslovak Government-in-Exile led by Edvard Beneš.
Foreign factories were separated from mother company and ownership of plants in Czech lands was transferred to one member of the family.
Jan Antonín Baťa stayed in the Americas from 1939–1940, but as America entered the war, he felt it would be safer for his co-workers and their families back in occupied Czechoslovakia if he left the United States.
At the moment he left the protection of the United States, the British placed him on the "black list". It is believed that the communist influence on the Beneš' exile government was behind this. The official reason for this was Mr. Baťa's inability to pay a demand by the British government amounting to £250,000 (a huge sum of money at the time). The United Kingdom insisted on the huge bail because Mr. Baťa was the owner of the largest industrial concern in occupied Czechoslovakia, located in enemy territory and employing more than 40,000 Czechs and Slovaks.
After the war, Jan Antonín Baťa attempted (unsuccessfully) to clear his good name against communist accusations against him, in spite of 64 trumped up charges, typical mock trials and the inability of his attorneys to be allowed to offer a defence. Despite the organised effort against him, the jury of the time took the brave step of finding Jan innocent of all 64 charges. Communist Military Judge Sramek then invented two new charges against Jan Bat'a and found him guilty, thus expropriating his property in Czechoslovakia.
Two unsuccessful attempts were made by the family of Jan Baťa to clear him of the communist era charges. The first attempt was made during 1968. The second attempt was made via a lawsuit filed in Prague in 1993. Finally on the third attempt in 2007, Jan Bata was cleared of all charges made against him.
In 1945, the Czech companies were nationalized under the Beneš decrees, part of a large scale nationalisation programme in Czechoslovakia.
After the communist party took overall power in 1948, it tried to suppress all memory of Tomáš and the Bata enterprise. Tomas Bata was portrayed as a ruthless capitalist, in pursuit of higher profit, yet Baťa employees were typically paid from 3-5 times the wages of their counterparts around the world (see Svatopluk Turek). Furthermore, Bat'a employees were recipients of benefits such as life insurance, healthcare, long term care, and generous savings accounts for retirement. Bata even gifted employees' babies generous bank accounts.
The company was renamed as Svit and the town of Zlín as Gottwaldov (after the leader of the communist party). The Svit factory concentrated on the domestic market. During the following decades, its ability to compete and its technological infrastructure declined due to under-investment, weak management and bad decisions.
Anticipating the Second World War, Thomas J. Bata, the founder's son, together with over 100 families from Czechoslovakia, moved to Canada in 1939 to develop the Bata Shoe Company of Canada, including a shoe factory and engineering plant, centred in a town that still bears his name, Batawa, Ontario. Thomas J. Bata successfully established and ran the new Canadian operations and, during the war years, he sought to maintain the necessary coordination with as many of the overseas Bata operations as was possible. During this period, the Canadian engineering plant manufactured strategic components for the Allies' war effort and Thomas J. Bata worked together with the Czechoslovak government-in-exile of President Beneš and with other democratic powers. The Second World War saw many Bata businesses in Europe and the Far East destroyed. After the Second World War, the core business enterprise in Czechoslovakia and other major enterprises in Central and Eastern Europe were nationalised by the Communist governments. Thomas devoted himself to the rebuilding and growth of the Bata Shoe Organisation, together with his wife and partner, Sonja. He successfully spearheaded ethical and innovative expansion into new markets throughout Asia, the Middle East, Africa and Latin America. Under his leadership, the Bata Shoe Organisation experienced unprecedented growth and became the world's largest manufacturer and marketer of footwear, selling over 300 million pairs of shoes each year and employing over 80,000 people. In 1964, the headquarters of the Bata Shoe Organisation was moved to Toronto, Canada and in 1965 it moved into an ultra-modern building, the Bata International Centre. The Bata Shoes' former headquarters in North York, Ontario was designed in the 1960s by architect John B. Parkin. The building was later sold and was to be replaced by a cultural centre, museum and park.[2] Other Bata family contributions to Canadian life include: Mrs. Sonja I. Bata founding the Bata Shoe Museum in Toronto in 1998, Mr. and Mrs. Bata being supporters of Trent University, where the Thomas J. Bata Library bears Bata's name and supporters of York University in Toronto.
After the Second World War, the Bata Shoe Organisation was led by Thomas J. Bata (Tomáš Baťa Junior), son of Tomáš Baťa and the company grew significantly under Thomas J. Bata's driving leadership. In 2002, the headquarters was moved to Lausanne, Switzerland and the organisation has been led by Thomas G. Bata, grandson of Tomáš Baťa.
After the global economic changes in 1990s, the company closed a number of its manufacturing factories in developed countries and has focussed its activities on expanding its retail business there. In developing countries it still has a large number of manufacturing units and still produces a significant number of shoes each year.:
The company is currently headquartered in Lausanne, Switzerland, with 3 business units
Current shoe brands are:
According to Bata, in 2007, the company served 1 million customers per day, employed over 40,000 people, operated 4,600 retail stores, managed a retail presence in over 50 countries and had 40 production facilities across 26 countries.
After the "Velvet Revolution" in November 1989, Thomas J. Baťa arrived as soon as December 1989. He was warmly welcomed by the population.
The Czechoslovak government offered him the opportunity to invest in the ailing Svit. Since companies "nationalised" before 1948 were not returned to their original owners, the state continued to own Svit and "privatised" it during voucher privatisation in Czechoslovakia. Its inability to compete in the free market led to its decline and in 2000 Svit went bankrupt.
The 1968 Czech film All My Compatriots by Vojtěch Jasný, in a scene set in 1948, refers to Baťa putting small shoemakers out of business.
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