Pom d’Api

French make of children’s footwear, which is the only one in France to cover all sectors of this niche market. The company exports 41% of its products. The brand was created in 1975 by the brothers Guy and Yvon Rautureau, who had joined their father’s business five years earlier and modernised it. In 1980 they create the Free Lance range, aimed at teenagers and women. The range conquered the fashion scene and boosted the company’s bank balance with imaginative designs like the Perfecto, with its diagonal zip fastening, worn by the singer Sting and copied all over the world, becoming a cult item for punk kids. They once again attracted youthful consumers in 1993 by raising the sole of the basketball boot by 5 centimetres: they sold 100,000 pairs in three months. In 1988 they acquired the Spring Court brand of tennis shoes. The company has two factories in France, but 40% of their production is with third parties in Tunisia and the Far East. They have 240 employees. In 1997 the Group produced 500,000 pairs of shoes, for a total turnover of 78 billion lire.