Boot Black is the premium shoe care brand of Japan’s largest shoe care manufacturer Columbus. A family owned company that dates back over 100 years, which in accordance to Japanese tradition always try do that little bit extra for the most demanding customers.
In Matsudo, north-east of Tokyo, in a high, relatively old building with a great retro style logo, the Columbus factory is housed. Columbus has been operating since 1919. It’s now run by the fourth generation of the Hattori family, the company remains one of the pillars of Japan’s shoe care industry, both under its own name and, to a limited extent, as a private label producer for well-known brands in Japan and Europe. Less than ten percent of production is private label. The core remains their own lines, and at the very top sits Boot Black.
– With Boot Black, we’ve tried to develop the best performing shoe care for the most demanding customers, says Koichi Takahashi, factory manager. Together with the laboratory manager Takao Tadokoro they guide me around the factory. They offered a transparent look into how modern shoe care is actually made – and what it really contains.
The Columbus factory, which among other things produce Boot Black shoe care.
One of the floors in the factory.
Koichi Takahashi, factory manager. Gen Ishimaki who was international sales manager when I visited, and Takao Tadokoro, laboratory manager.
We start off in a showroom where they display a small amount of the huge range of products that are produced here. On a table in the middle are a bunch of glass containers with a different ingredients in each, that essentially are the ingredients of most of the products here.
– A common misconception among consumers is that premium shoe care always equals purely natural ingredients. The reality is more nuanced, says laboratory manager Takao.
Most Boot Black products contain around ten different waxes and oils. Some are plant-based, some animal-based, and some synthetic. According to Takao, achieving the right balance between shine, nourishment, stability and workability requires this complexity.
Parts of the Boot Black shoe care range. Apart of the regular stuff, they also include a lot of special things like edge paint pencils and other really nerdy stuff.
The Artist Palette, an oil based polish, in a suitable display.
This is the basic Boot Black range, which has silver coloured packaging.
Columbus also produce lots of cheaper, standard shoe care products as well. Here’s some of them.
We do a crash course of what many of the ingredients do. Among the plant-based waxes, three different types of carnauba are used. The lighter coloured variant is often preferred, as it affects the overall tone of the polish less. Candelilla wax, also used in cosmetics such as lipstick, contributes both hardness and shine. Rice wax adds clarity to the finish. Montan wax, derived from coal, behaves similarly to carnauba and provides a hard, glossy surface. Selisine wax helps adjust consistency.
On the oil side, jojoba oil is commonly used in creams and softer waxes. Argan oil, well known from cosmetics, is valued for its nourishing properties and is found in products such as the Artist Palette and certain lotions. Camellia oil is even more nourishing, but considerably more expensive.
– There’s not only properties and how they affect how the product is to work with, one also have to take into account the price so that the products end up reasonably priced within its segments, Koichi Takahashi says.
Ingredients of shoe care. Waxes, oils, and more.
A cake of wax, looks like beeswax but don’t remember for sure.
Animal-based ingredients are also present. Beeswax offers a good balance of nourishment, protection and ease of application. A wax internally nicknamed “Snow White” leaves a distinctive surface pattern when cooling, resembling freshly fallen snow. Mink oil – highly nourishing – is today only used in Boot Black Mink Oil, and sparingly.
Synthetic waxes play an important role. Paraffin wax is stable and cost-effective. Microcrystalline wax requires careful handling but contributes to the right consistency. Polyethylene wax is added in small amounts to give the product an appealing surface when opening the jar – without it, the polish would look noticeably more matte.
To be able to mix all these products together, one in most cases need solvents. The solvents used by the Columbus factory are primarily petroleum-based. For shoe creams, emulsification is critical, and they say that plant-based waxes are difficult to combine with traditional solvents, to their experience. Petroleum solvents make the formulation more stable.
– We are exploring plant-based alternatives such as limonene, but these are currently more expensive and technically challenging, Takao Tadokoro says.
He emphasises that Columbus uses relatively small amounts of petroleum-based components, but argues that the company is open about their formulations.
– The demand for “all natural” products is increasing, but in practice many shoe care brands rely on similar technical solutions. The key difference is transparency, and we don’t try to hide it also with for example perfumes or similar.
Huge kettles where one boil ingredients together.
There’s a lot of similarities between factories producing shoe care products and cosmetic products.
After the thorough walkthrough and discussion about the ingredients they use, it’s time to walk around the factory. Production is spread across several floors in the factory building. On the lower level, the boiling room houses ten large kettles, each capable of processing between 100 and 1,000 kg per batch. Smaller units handle runs under ten kg.
Depending on the formulation, boiling takes between 30 and 60 minutes. The air carries a distinct scent of solvents, something not everyone appreciates, but an unavoidable part of the process. Around ten people work on this floor.
– Many of the machines are approximately 50 years old. During Japan’s economic boom they were acquired under favourable conditions, today equivalent specialised equipment is both expensive and difficult to source, factory manager Koichi Takahashi explains.
On the fourth floor, filling takes place. For standard Columbus creams in common colours, machines can fill up to 120 jars per minute. Boot Black, however, is filled entirely by hand. A skilled worker manages perhaps six jars per minute, since each is filled in two stages to achieve the correct level and surface.
– The reasons we do this with Boot Black is that when done by hand, one can get that nice fully even look of the products when one open the jar. If done by machine, you get a pit that doesn’t look as nice, says Koichi.
The jars then spend 20-30 minutes in a cooling room at 16 degrees celsius.
Regular ranges are filled with machines, doing several jars quickly.
Topped up.
For Boot Black, it’s done by hand, to achieve a completely even surface when customers open the jars, not a pit that becomes when machines do it.
A lot of work for a small detail. Japanese style.
They also fill Boot Black wax cans by hand, which doesn’t really make the same difference as with the looser consistency cream.
Labels on Boot Black jars are applied by hand to ensure perfect alignment between the front label and the orientation of the lid. I tell them that I would never think about something like that, and never heard of someone who does. But hey, I’m a European. According to the Columbus people it’s a small detail, but one that especially Japanese customers notice. When they say they are to go all the way with Boot Black, it seems they mean it.
Tube creams are manufactured on the third floor. The tubes arrive directly from the level above the boilers and are fed into specialised filling machines. Aerosol products are mixed in-house but filled by an external specialist, due to regulatory and technical requirements. Columbus is currently developing aerosol-free waterproofing alternatives.
The packaging floor.
Jars waiting to be labelled.
To have the front of the label aligned with the text of the lid, this part is also done by hand on Boot Black products.
Tubes being filled and closed in the same machine.
Leather soap.
The coolest places in factories producing shoe care products, is always the laboratory. Here it’s located on the top floor, where around ten people work with development and quality control. Machines measure consistency and pH value – most products are neutral at pH 7, though some are slightly acidic, down to pH 4. Shine is also measured. On their internal scale, matte registers at zero, while high-shine polishes reach 80-90.
Interestingly, Takao Tadokoro explains that shoe cream jars are best stored upside down.
– This reduces solvent evaporation and extends shelf life. Officially, the recommended condition period is three years, but in practice products can last five years or more if stored properly.
The business for premium shoe care is competitive nowadays, at the same time as the broader market is shifting. As people dress more casually, overall demand for traditional shoe care has been affected. High-shine wax polish is no longer a daily necessity for many. Yet within this context, Boot Black represents a deliberate pursuit of refinement. Hand filling, complex formulations, and careful quality control shows a commitment to detail rather than scale. One hope there will always be room for that in this world.
Read a review of a bunch of Boot Black products here.
The laboratory of the factory.
Products stored upside down, for prolonged lifespan.
One of many machines measuring various stuff in the products.Here it’s the PH value that’s measued.
Measuring shine.
Abrasion testing.
More durability testing, where leather strips are pulled back and forth.
Old school time clock, where factory workers stamp in and out. Matches much of the 50 year old machinery found in the factory well.
The outcome of the work of the factory. The Columbus owner love Florence in Italy, and the Giglio bottonato, or its original French name Fleur de lis that it’s more known under, is used as a symbol for Boot Black.
