Toms shoes a dedication to social responsibility case study

Margaret A. Peteraf Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth

Sean Zhang and Meghan L. Cooney Research Assistants, Dartmouth College

While traveling in Argentina in 2006, Blake Mycoskie witnessed the hardships that children without shoes experienced and became committed to making a difference. Rather than focusing on charity work, Mycoskie sought to build an organization capable of sustainable, repeated giving, where children would be guaranteed shoes throughout their childhood. He established Shoes for a Better Tomorrow, better known as TOMS, as a for-profit company based on the premise of the “One for One” Pledge. For every pair of shoes TOMS sold, TOMS would donate a pair to a child in need. By mid-2016, TOMS had given way over 50 million pairs of shoes in over 70 different countries. 1

As a relatively new and privately held company, TOMS experienced consistent and rapid growth despite the global recession that began in 2009. By 2015, TOMS had matured into an organization with nearly 500 employees and almost $400 million in revenues. TOMS shoes could be found in several major retail stores such as Nordstrom, Bloomingdale’s, and Urban Outfitters. In addition to providing shoes for underprivileged children, TOMS also expanded its mission to include restoring vision to those with curable sight-related illnesses by developing a new line of eyewear products. For an overview of how quickly TOMS expanded in its first seven years of business, see Exhibit 1 . 2

2015

2014

2013

2012

2011

2010

2009

2008

2007

2006

Total Employees

470

450

400

320

250

72

46

33

19

4

Thousands of Pairs of Shoes Sold

25,000

10,000

7,250

2,700

1,300

1,000

230

110

50

10

EXHIBIT 1

TOMS’ Growth in Employees and Sales, 2006–2015

Source: PrivCo, Private Company Financial Report, “TOMS Shoes, Inc.,” created April 18, 2016.

Company Background
While attending Southern Methodist University, Blake Mycoskie founded the first of his six startups, a laundry service company that encompassed seven colleges and staffed over 40 employees. Four startups and a short stint on The Amazing Race later, Mycoskie found himself vacationing in Argentina where he not only learned about the alpargata shoe originally used by local peasants in the 14th century, but also witnessed the extreme poverty in rural Argentina.

Determined to make a difference, Mycoskie believed that providing shoes could more directly impact the children in these rural communities than delivering medicine or food. Aside from protecting children’s feet from infections, parasites, and diseases, shoes were often required for a complete school uniform. In addition, research had shown that shoes were found to significantly increase children’s self-confidence, help them develop into more active community members, and lead them to stay in school. Thus, by ensuring access to shoes, Mycoskie could effectively increase children’s access to education and foster community activism, raising the overall standard of living for people living in poor Argentinian rural areas.

Dedicated to his mission, Mycoskie purchased 250 pairs of alpargatas and returned home to Los Angeles, where he subsequently founded TOMS Shoes. He built the company on the promise of “One for One,” donating a pair of shoes for every pair sold. With an initial investment of $300,000, Mycoskie’s business concept of social entrepreneurship was simple: sell both the shoe and the story behind it. Building on a simple slogan that effectively communicated his goal, Mycoskie championed his personal experiences passionately and established deep and lasting relationships with customers.

Operating from his apartment with three interns he found on Craigslist, Mycoskie quickly sold out his initial inventory and expanded considerably, selling 10,000 pairs of shoes by the end of his first year. With family and friends, Mycoskie ventured back to Argentina, where they hand-delivered 10,000 pairs of shoes to children in need. Because he followed through on his mission statement, Mycoskie was able to subsequently attract investors to support his unique business model and expand his venture significantly.

When TOMS was founded, TOMS operated as the for-profit financial arm while a separate entity titled “Friends of TOMS” focused on charity work and giving. After 2011, operations at Friends of TOMS were absorbed into TOMS’s own operations as TOMS itself matured. In Friends of TOMS’s latest accessible 2011 501(c)(3) filing, assets were reported at less than $130,000. 3 Moreover, as of May 2013, the Friends of TOMS website was discontinued while TOMS also ceased advertising its partnership with Friends of TOMS in marketing campaigns and on its corporate website. The developments suggested that Friends of TOMS became a defunct entity as TOMS incorporated all of its operations under the overarching TOMS brand.

Industry Background
Even though Mycoskie’s vision for his company was a unique one, vying for a position in global footwear manufacturing was a risky and difficult venture. The industry was both stable and mature—one in which large and small companies competed on the basis of price, quality, and service. Competitive pressures came from foreign as well as domestic companies and new entrants needed to fight for access to downstream retailers.

Further, the cost of supplies was forecast to increase between 2013 and 2020. Materials and wages constituted over 70 percent of industry costs—clearly a sizable concern for competitors. Supply purchases included leather, rubber, plastic compounds, foam, nylon, canvas, laces, and so on. While the price of leather rose steadily each year, the price of rubber also began to climb at an average annual rate of 7.6 percent. Wages were expected to increase at a rate of 5.8 percent over a five-year period due to growing awareness of how manufacturers took advantage of cheap, outsourced labor. 4