2. Recently Hunter has added outerwear (leather footwear and handbags) to their international product range. What are the pros and cons of extending the product range in this way? Should Hunter Boots Ltd include further products like eyewear and watches? The Hunter boot brand (www.hunter-boot.com) has become a symbol of British country life and celebrity fashion. Hunter boots, designed over 150 years ago, were originally created to deal with Britain’s rugged and unpredictable weather. Today, Hunter is firmly established as a fashion brand beloved by Hollywood celebrities.

Arthur Wellesley, the first Duke of Wellington, instructed his shoemaker, Hoby of St James Street, London, to modify his eighteenth-century boot. They designed the boots in soft calfskin leather, removed the trim and made the cut closer around the leg. It was hard to wear the new boots in battle but it was said that the Duke of Wellington wore the boots at the famous Battle of Waterloo in 1815. The boots were dubbed ‘Wellingtons’

or ‘wellies’ and the name stuck.

Wellingtons quickly caught on with patriotic British gentlemen eager to emulate their war hero. The original Wellington boots were made of leather; however, in America, where there was more experimentation in shoemaking, producers were beginning to manufacture using rubber. One such entrepreneur, Mr Henry Lee Norris, moved to Scotland in search of a suitable site to produce rubber footwear. Eventually he found it on the farm of the Castle Mill in Edinburgh. Norris began his boot-making company, the North British Rubber Company (the company changed its name to the Hunter Rubber Company in 2004), in 1856. Committed to fit, comfort, durability and performance Hunter Wellington boots bear two rare and coveted stamps of approval of the British royal family.