Bata Shoes

Bata Shoes is the world's largest shoe company. It is also the world's largest family-owned company. It is currently headquartered in Toronto, Canada.

The Bata Shoe Company was founded in 1894 in Zlín in what is today the Czech Republic but was then the Austro-Hungarian Empire. It was founded by Tomas Bata whose family had been cobblers for three hundred years. Bata's company, however, was a very modern industrial concern becoming one of the first mass producers of shoes.

The company grew quickly. It survived handily the upheavals of World War I and the break up of Austro-Hungary. The company quickly spread throughout Europe and developed branches in North America, Asia, and North Africa as well. In 1932 Tomas Bata died in a plane crash and his son Thomas J. Bata became head of the company. The youger Bata established the Canadian operation in 1939 in response to the unstable political situation in Europe.

The company continued to survive in its adopted home, spreading through the developing world and opening manufacturing plants in India and throughout the world.

The Bata family and the company have been major charitable donors, especially in Canada where they have founded such projects as the Bata Shoe Musuem in Toronto and the Bata Library and Trent University.

In its history the company has sold 14 billion pairs of shoes.