How to find a shoe factory in portugal

Portugal, small country in southern Portugal is famous for great weather, beautiful beaches, Cristiano Ronaldo (of  course) and…prestigious footwear industry.  That’s correct, Portugal hosts some of the most premium handmade manufacturers in the World. That’s no secret that some of the most prestigious brands in the world choose Portuguese factories, because they know the job will get well done.

Where can you find a shoe factory in portugal?

The most famous areas of manufacturing  is the area of Felgueiras and S. João da Madeira. White Felgueiras is more famous for making more mass consuming footwear (cheaper but higher minimum order quantities), white São João da Madeira is famous for super premium handmade footwear production.
Some of the shoe factories may be found online, but most of them you will never find them unless you are in the market for a long time now. And trust me, most of the shoe factories they prefer to stay unnoticed and keep their loyal and profitable customer base. The reality is that you are a start-up with no name in the footwear market they will most likely ignore your project even if you reach their minimum order quantities.  On average if a start-up brand comes around with a new project usually need around two years for their ideas to come alive. The reason behind this is – first you need to find a shoe factory to accept your project (this can take 3 months the least), then you need to discuss your sample design and materials (this can take 3 months), then making the prototype (2 months), last samples (2 months) and the process repeats again for production .  As a start up brand how can you resolve this? Big delays and no bad surprises can be avoided by choosing private label already developed models.

What is the process of making shoes inside a shoe factory in Portugal?

Inside a portuguese shoe factory you can find 5 important steps:
Material cutting: This step is where the leather or fabrics of the shoes are cut according with design;
Stitching: After the upper materials are cut, they can finally be stitched altogether. The shoe factory  using high qualified stitchers finally start to give form to the shoes;
Assembly: Having the upper materials cut these are ready to be bonded to the outsole with the support of the pre decided shoe last.
Finishing: The process of finishing the shoes is key in a shoe factory process. Here all the imperfections must be corrected as any dirts or loose stitches.
Please note is perfectly normal shoe factories to subhire part of these steps to other entities. These allow the shoe manufacturer be more efficient in their process w

Where private label my shoes in Portugal

The private label process has now been used for well-established brands  all over the world. The reason behind this it facilitates the work for the manufacturer and brand as well. In the past brands needed to invest a huge amount of money in prototyping, sampling and testing. Nowadays the story is a bit different. Factories develop the models and they propose to the brands create their collections with their label on them on the shoes they developed.
At Treec Footwear we specialize in developing collections with private label purpose so brands or shops can easily have their own brand.  We heavily test the materials and different models so the retailer and end client can be pleased.
The brand owner just need to invest some time on thinking how place their brand on the shoes.

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