THE STORY OF PROALP

At Proalp we love to say, we are one big happy family. It sounds cliché but it’s true. The whole story started with a couple of friends who got bigger with every friend joining their team. Proalp’s path to success is tightly intertwined with Tržič’s shoemaking history (if you would like to know more about it, you can read it here) and the nature we are surrounded by.

It all started a couple of decades ago when Proalp’s founder Matej Slapar entered the world of shoemaking craftsmanship. The opportunity arose in the Tržič’s factory Peko, where he got his first job in the development department. Back then Peko was an extremely successful company that was known worldwide for its high-quality shoes and rich knowledge about designing shoes. Only the development department counted more than 150 employees whose main task was improving the shoe design. As a part of that team, Matej frequently visited fashion fairs and attended many educational exchanges with other shoemaking companies. He found his passion in developing shoe soles and lasts and gained plenty of knowledge and experience in this field.

After years working in Peko, Matej felt like he has enough knowledge and experience to create something on his own. He started developing soles prototypes for big companies around Europe and soon got joined by his friend Zoran Georgiev. Together they pour their knowledge into creating shoes as well. Matej was designing the lower part (sole, inner sole) and Zoran was designing the upper parts of the shoe. The main principle while designing shoes was to create comfortable, healthy shoes, made from the best, first-class materials. The first workshop was stationed in Matej’s house in one of beautiful Tržič’s villages. They didn’t forget about the tradition of shoemaking that they learned from their ancestors, who were one of the best local masters of shoemaking, and decided to offer hand-stitched, every day shoes made by the process called flex-stitch (more about it, you can read here).  Costumers soon recognized the high quality of Proalp’s shoes and more and more people who had problems with feet turned to Matej for help. At that point, the custom-made shoes became part of our permanent offer.

The company was becoming bigger and soon more shoemaking machines were brought to our workshop. A lot of local shoemakers and seamstresses joined us as our subcontractors so we could offer more shoes to people who value health and quality above everything in their life. The first stores were opened at that point as well which included Matej’s sons and offer them new learning experiences. At this point, development was the main focus of Proalp and it was time to introduce something new.

Matej and the whole Proalp team comes from Tržič, where we are surrounded by forests, river, and especially mountains. We grew up to love and respect nature as well as to explore it. That’s why Matej introduced the new shoe line of hiking and mountaineering shoes. As a hiking enthusiast himself, he understands hiking needs first hand. Our hiking and mountaineering shoes became a great success as they fitted all the hikers’ needs.

The nature remained the biggest inspiration for Matej and when people keep coming to him with different feet problems, he started noticing that his customer’s feet lost a lot of their natural functions. Lots of natural functions got lost from not moving barefoot anymore, however in Slovenia shoes are an essential part of attire as the climate and the terrain can be unfriendly sometimes. That is when he discovered barefoot shoes and started developing his models. While developing the first barefoot shoe prototypes Matej made countless measurements and feet observations to create the ultimate barefoot shoes that will support all the natural feet functions. Using the first-class natural material was going hand in hand with the idea of creating barefoot shoes, and till these days those materials remain Proalp’s trademark.

In short, this is the story of Matej and Proalp, however, we shall never forget to mention that Proalp is much more than this. Proalp is all the local seamstresses and shoemaker families that help us create our shoes. Proalp is all material producers, all partners from abroad, all employees, and all the customers. And we love it that way.  We believe that respect for tradition and nature remains the biggest inspiration that brought us to the point we can proudly share our story with the world!