Macarthur - the story behind the brand - tribute to my Dad this Fathers Day

This Sunday the 1st Sept is Fathers Day, but this time of year is doubly special for our family as the 25th August is our Dad's birthday.

My father Bozo' died young - only 64 years over 25 years ago and we still missed him everyday. He was a generous and kind man. Positive and with a quick sense of humour he strived to achieve as much as he could in his life. Anyone that knew or worked with him would know that he worked hard and took proud in creating a product and business that was of the highest quality.

It was over 60 years ago that Mandic Shoes begin in our family garage in Leichhardt, Sydney. It then moved to a factory in Marrickville where a lot of shoe factories was based. It was a good time to make shoes. With limited importation, Australia made shoes were prominent in the market and could be made and sold at competitive prices.

In the late 1970's we had a huge factory fire and Dad had to start again. Never deterred, he used this as a opportunity to build in an new and exciting region  near Campbelltown - The Macarthur area.

Everyone though he was crazy to move so far out of the inner Sydney area. How were you going to find skilled staff? What about suppliers?  Well dad found staff and trained them, and well, the suppliers and Reps just had to come to us. I think they enjoyed the day out of the City anyway!

Well, he did it. We were one of the first factories built in the new Macarthur development area in Minto. Close to the railway line we use to dispatch all our goods by Rail and with open fields and cattle grazing across the road, It was a pretty huge change.

Over the many years based in Minto we became well known to the local community as we had an onsite discount retail store selling seconds and clearance lines. As well as other brands of footwear we bought in, we became a one stop shoe shop. After over almost 40 years, we started getting 2nd generation families buying from us with adults saying they use to came to our factory shop when they were kids!

Our whole family worked. My afternoons and Saturdays growing up were spent working in the factory or in the shop, serving customers and well, looking back, I would not have had it any other way!

In honour of our heritage supporting the Macarthur region we developed our premium quality boot range and named it MACARTHUR.