Cobbler

Job overview
Making shoes involves cutting and stitching the upper leather, putting in the eyelets, cutting leather or synthetic soles and affixing the upper leather to the sole.

What do people do in this job?
A distinction must be made between the private cobbler and the maker of footwear in a factory.

The private cobbler works in a small workshop, using the minimum of machinery, and most of the work is done by hand.

In fact today private cobblers mainly concentrate on shoe repairs. ?

In the much bigger shoe factory the production of shoes is mostly done by machines.

The equipment used to stitch the top portion of the shoe, is similar to, that in a clothing factory, e.g. ?the button, eyelet-sewing, punching, cutting and buttonhole machines, but is a bit bigger with different adjustments and , of course, the material used is leather and synthetics.

Even here some of the work is done by hand.

Shoe-factories are designed so that the different tasks succeed in a logical sequence.

The work is repetitive.

What kinds of people are suitable for this career?
Manual dexterity and the skilful handling of tools are important and in a factory employees must be willing to do the same work on the machine every day.

Statistics show that there are a number of people with disabilities active in the footwear trade.

The nature and degree of disability determine the task that disabled employees can do.

What qualifications are needed?
Good eyesight, manual dexterity and reasonably good physical strength are the main requirements.