Ask the Apprentice Cobbler

I started a new job a few weeks back, actually, about two months ago now, at a shoe repair shop. It’s been quite educational. Although the sign says “shoe repair” we also work on purses, belts, luggage, jackets… anything leather. Had a guy come in with custom-made eyepatches my first week. Just yesterday, I was looking through some shelves at a our Valparaiso location and came across an arm - seems an amputee needed some adjustment to the leather straps on his prosthesis. So… we’re more than just shoe repair.

Me, I’m someone who has had a leatherworking hobby for about 10-12 years now, a life-long urge to fix things, and now I’m getting on-the-job training to be a cobbler. I certainly don’t know everything, but I’ll do my best to answer.

So… ask away!

What a cool opportunity!! I actually come from cobblers. My great grandfather was from a family of cobblers in Ukraine and when they started coming here, they set up shop in NY. My grandfather still has his father’s tools.
So, are you an actual apprentice? When I think of apprentice anything, I think of the people who start as apprentice blacksmiths at Old Sturbridge Village when they’re teenagers. One of their apprentices now is a retiree though and one of their non-apprentice/non-master (what’s that? journeyman?) is in his very early 20s.

Anyway, what I’m trying to say is are you gonna move up the ranks like that? Ugh, my brain hurts.
What have you personally fixed so far? Where is your shop located? The only cobblers I see these days are in malls and offer 1 hour shoe repair (though they do other stuff too).

I have a pair of leather shoes I’d love to have repaired but I think they’re beyond help. The soles are fine. My dogs have been gnawing on the upper part though. :frowning:

Do you have people bring in cheap shoes that can’t be repaired?

So you guys can fix the zipper on my leather jacket after all! I knew it.

How much would it cost to replace a leather coat zipper? (Approximately)

Do you do bespoke shoes? why are these so hard to find?

So far as I know, there is no formal ranking of cobblers in the US. It’s not a formal apprenticeship program, it’s on-the-job training. I frequently say “apprentice cobbler” to new customers, since it can be shorter than saying “I’m a new hire who is partly trained to do some shoe repairs, in addition to selling merchandise, handling customer complaints, and cleaning the place up when time allows”. Which is, more or less, the role of an apprentice in many trades.

The owners have taken some college level training in orthotics and prosthetics through the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University in Chicago, hence the occasional appearance of people with specialty shoe requirements and, well, artificial arms (apparently). Only those two, having completed such training, are permitted to do that work.

Lots of uppers, mostly (it’s that leatherworking background). A dozen or so loafers restitched, work boot uppers, a pair of cracked soles, and LOT of high heels and ladies boots. That is, in part, because so much of the work is ladies’ dress shoes and they were behind on them when I was hired, so it made sense to train me on those first. I haven’t yet been authorized to work on men’s heels, or women’s low heel casual shoes of similar construction. I can do workboot uppers but not soles or heels yet. Also have worked on purses, luggage, jackets, and belts. I’ve done zipper repair on boots and jackets. I can do rivets and such, but the biggest problem are prior employees who didn’t know/understand jack about it and completely messed up the parts organization for those items.

We have two located in Meijer’s stores, one in Merrillville and one in Mishawaka, Indiana. We also have a stand-alone storefront in Valparaiso.

Yes, that’s sort of the Meijer’s stores – except we don’t say “1 hour shoe repair” because, frankly, some things take longer than an hour. When people come in some items I can fix in 10-15 minutes, while they wait or shop. Others require overnight or even up to a couple weeks (the latter for when we have to order something, usually).

I won’t fix the heels on high heels while people wait – because I’m new I have to move slowly and think about what I’m doing, it’s not second nature like it is for some of the more experienced people. Having a customer looming over my shoulder while I do it is just not good. Also, sometimes I take a bit too much off with the sander, requiring me to re-do the heel tip. That’s not damaging the shoe itself, just the bit I’m replacing. I really don’t like having to do a re-do in front of a customer, though sometimes even are experts make a mistake and have to correct it. With my inexperience, having someone shifting from foot to foot saying “Hurry up! Hurry up!” is not conducive to good results.

One guy at the store, I’ll call him Mr. N, recently repaired 40 pairs of shoes/boots in one day. My output for the day was four pairs. That gives you an idea of the speed difference (also, Mr. N was only doing shoes – I was waiting on customers, keeping him organized so he’d do the pairs that had been there longest first, restocking shelves, etc.) Now, once I’ve got a pair done the customers can’t tell whether Mr. N or I’ve done the work, which is the idea, it just takes me a lot longer to get it done properly.

It does make me feel good when someone comes to pick up their shoes and pronounces them “perfect!” and I know I did the work.

Ah, dogs… a couple weeks ago we had no less than 5 separate people come in with dog damage. Surprisingly, the yorkies do more damage than the pit bulls. I think it’s because the yorkies work at it, gnawing away for hours if they can, whereas with the pits it usually they bite through something picking it up but don’t really chew methodically.

When people call on the phone we suggest they actually bring them in if it’s not too much trouble. Until we see it, it’s hard to say for sure. Often, even if we can’t make them perfect again we can make substantial improvements, enough so the shoe is usable again. If you look close you might see teeth marks, but at normal conversational distances maybe not so obvious.

But yeah, there’s a good chance they’re done.

Yep.

Also cheap shoes that could be repaired for a lot more money than the shoe was sold for originally. In that case, I tell them their options (I know many things that can be done, even if I can’t do them myself yet) and the price and let them decide. Sometimes, people with hard to fit feet who have a really comfortable pair of shoes will repair them even if it costs substantial money. Others don’t want to bother.

When they abandon hopeless cases we sometimes save them to use to train new people. That way, we practice on shoes nobody cares about instead of customer shoes until we are sufficiently proficient to do real repairs. The other means of training is to bring your own shoes in and work on them until you’re good enough to work for actual customers.

Sometimes we can fix zippers, sometimes we can’t, it depends on what’s wrong with them. We recently refunded the repair money to a lady whose boots we tried to fix three times – we completely replaced the zipper, only to have it fail again within 24-48 hours. We finally admitted we didn’t know what the heck was going on, but we simply couldn’t make a lasting repair, so, lady, here’s your money back.

Anyhow – often, we can fix a zipper without replacing it, which is much cheaper, quicker, and (usually) easier than a a replacement.

A replacement for a jacket zipper starts at $35 at our shop.

A lot of shops want nothing to do with zippers. They can be a pain in the backside.

I’m not sure what you mean by “bespoke” shoes. Do you mean shoes made by a specific company, or handmade to individual specification shoes?

I have a pair of slingbacks that are too pointy. One shoe shop has already ‘stretched’ them and they’re about one layer of skin roomier (and with a liquid stain on the suede part!). If I try another shop, that seems to have a better cobbler in charge, how much room could he possibly squeeze out for me? They look like this, but in peach non-patent leather.

Ooh! How about a one-inch tear in a jacket? It’s where the pocket is set in, in the leather itself, not a loose seam. I worry it’ll look bad once repaired.

I looove shoes-- they’re little works of art! Would you like to come play in my closet? :wink:

While we do use a spray for shoe stretching, it shouldn’t ever stain the shoes.

At best, you can get a half size out of stretching a pair of shoes. Pointies like what you show in the picture are a bit problematic for mechanical shoe stretching. You might do better having the shoes sprayed and then walking in them with your actual feet for an hour.

Really, the best thing is to purchase shoes that fit well from the start (yes, I know that’s a whole other issue, and our feet change over time). Beyond that, you can only stretch shoes so far.

A clean tear - one that is not too ragged - can often be repaired. The result still shows where the tear/cut occurred, but looks more like a crease or scratch than a gaping hole. One technique I’ve been using lately is to patch it from the inside, anchoring each side of the tear to the patch underneath (usually using glue of some sort) rather than attempting to sew across the rip, which usually looks like crap.

This is another instance of I can’t make it perfect but I can make it better. We can vastly improve the appearance, even if some trace of damage remains. Next to pockets, by the way, is a common spot for what you describe. I think it’s from pockets getting snagged on passing objects.

Oddly enough, I’m not a shoe aficionado or collector. I seldom purchase shoes, never wear heals, and almost always stick with plain boring black or brown. On the other hand, I’ve been taking my shoes and boots to cobblers for years for repairs so maybe it’s not so surprising I wound up fixing them for a living.

I have a pair of vintage cowboy boots (nice ones, Justins) that have developed a crack over my bunion - it’s almost all the way through the leather in a highly stressed part of the boot. I know it’s probably my fault for not oiling them or something. What are the chances of my local place being able to fix them? I don’t care if the mend shows, just that it’s strong. I love those boots - I paid 50 bucks for them a year ago at Urban Outfitters of all godforsaken places and they have been worth every penny. I’d gladly pay $20 to get the crack fixed, and more grudgingly pay $40 or so, especially if the same area on the other boot could be reinforced. I’ll probably just go to the shop tomorrow, they’re very friendly, but I have been dreading hearing them say there’s nothing they can do :frowning:

Also, congrats on what seems like a really interesting and satisfying job!

How can I tell if a pair of shoes I own are resoleable (spelling?)? I know that my other two pairs of dress shoes are Goodyear welted, which apparently is one method of attaching soles, but the third pair look similar from the top. That is, they have the thread going around the whole shoe, but they have a rubber sole underneath what looks sort of like wood. I have no idea if I’m describing this well at all.

I was drafted into the Marines in 1969. After boot camp and infantry training I was sent to an Army Base in Virginia (Ft Lee) to learn shoe repair. I found it pretty interesting. Anyway, a few months later I was sent back to the Marines at which time I was informed that the Marines hadn’t fixed shoes for 25 years. Turns out the military was phasing out boots and shoes with welts (the layer of leather to which soles are stitched onto). In their place were boots with the soles simply glued onto the uppers. When they wore out, the were trashed.

I do have a question about the machinery, a lot of which isn’t made anymore. When something breaks, do you have to find a machine shop to manufacture the part?

Back to 1969…after being informed that my shoe repair services weren’t needed, I was issued a rifle.

Last!

There’s this stuff called “Shoe Goo” that you can shovel into the crack. It forms a strong, flexible bond (we use it to seal cracks in rubber soles). You scoosh it in there and level it off. The directions say to wait 1-2 hours and smooth out bumps. Wait about 24-48 hours, then you can sand off any excess on the exterior. If necessary, apply another layer (and wait another 48 hours - people are puzzled why we say to budget a week for this, but it’s because it takes that long for the goop to cure).

The results may not be cosmetically wonderful (though, obviously, the skill of the person applying it can be a huge factor here - the stuff is incredibly sticky and messy) but it will seal the crack and make the boots whole again, functional, and so forth.

Other than that, we could sew a patch over it. We do that with heavy duty workboots sometimes. Again, the cosmetics aren’t great but it does result in a functional boot.

Whether or not your local shop will do that is up to them.

You have to kind of be able to actually look at the shoe, or at least I do, and sometimes I still get it wrong being new to this.

Soles joined to the upper by a welt are repairable.

Some soles that are glued are repairable, but not all of them. I’ve seen the rubber-attached-to-wood construction as well, and those can usually be repaired by sanding off the rubber and applying a new sole to the base. Usually.

Molded rubber soles are a problem. They aren’t really replaceable and attempting to bond new rubber to the old is problematic at best. We usually tell people they’re not repairable, though if someone insists we might give it a try, but we won’t guarantee how long it will last.

Lately I’ve been seeing a lot of shoes where the problem is that they weren’t properly cemented/glued in the first place. Soles using glue should have the glue layered over the whole surface, edge to edge, but I’m seeing new shoes with just a squiggle of cement down the center of the sole. No wonder they come apart. We can apply an edge-to-edge layer of cement then put them into a press to compress the layers together for maximum bonding. These can last a surprisingly long period of time if done properly.

Honestly, I don’t know.

I do know that one of our sewing machines has been out for repairs for six weeks. Apparently there are problems with getting parts.

how would you repair a cut halfway deep into the leather, on the welt, of a work boot?

As long as all of the leather is still there, patching it from behind with a scrap of leather and Barge / Cobbler’s Choice cement can usually yield an acceptable repair without stitching. 90% of the work is in getting to the backside without having to disassemble too much of the jacket.

The guy I worked with 20 years ago joked that he could make a living forever just on light switches and door knobs as those things seem to reach out and snag jackets.

SanDiegoTim - The machinery is remarkably unchanged over the years, and it’s also pretty simple stuff and fairly standardized. Not hard to accomplish when there were only four or five dominant manufacturers The shop I was at had a Singer patcher and a Landis line finisher, and both companies are still in business. By now, the Landis is 70 years old and probably still seeing regular use somewhere around Sacramento. It’s a huge cast iron monster, and the only way I could think it could be killed would be if you left it out in the rain for a couple years, or if you bashed it with a sledgehammer. Otherwise, Landis is still selling parts for it.

Must not be from one of those old-line makers that built stuff a blacksmith could service. :smiley:

Ever had any problems with elves?