Tracking Caterpillar

Caterpillar’s first tractor rolled off the assembly line over 80 years ago. Since then the company has become a market leader in the field of construction vehicles and extended its brand into footwear. But how did a construction giant navigate the step into mainstream fashion? Johnny Acton follows the trail of the Caterpillar brand.

Caterpillar Inc. of Peoria, Illinois is the world’s leading manufacturer of construction vehicles. The company was formed in 1925 when the C.L. Best Tractor Co. merged with The Holt Manufacturing Company, the firm responsible for developing the treaded metal belt track system introduced in 1904 for which that company became known. In the early years, the Caterpillar Tractor Co., as the business was then known, concentrated on doing what it said on the tin: it built tractors. Now Caterpillar manufactures more than 300 different machines and vehicles. It has grown into a global giant, with annual sales in 2004 in excess of $30 billion.

For three generations, Caterpillar Inc. was synonymous with heavy duty industrial machinery. In recent years, however, the company’s famous ‘yellow triangle’ logo has begun to appear in a surprising new context: on the feet of sophisticated urbanites. The firm that manufactures the 797B Mining Truck, a behemoth weighing 253 tonnes when it’s empty and almost 600 with a full payload, is also big in the world of shoes and boots. So big, in fact, that between1994 and 2005 some 57 million pairs of CAT Footwear were sold worldwide. Caterpillar Inc.’s venture into the footwear business (in partnership with Wolverine World Wide) has proved one of the most imaginative and successful brand-extension exercises in corporate history.

The popularity of Caterpillar footwear can only partly be explained by the brand’s established reputation among construction workers. The fact that industrial chic is a recurrent theme within the fashion business is another ingredient in the mix. But perhaps the key to the success of CAT footwear, leaving aside its admirable quality, is the ease with which the public can be persuaded that shoes and boots bearing the ‘Caterpillar’ logo will indeed be ‘Walking Machines’ (to quote a company phrase, registered as a UK Trademark on 7 April 1995, No. 1562167). The strength of the brand has allowed Caterpillar to expand its range way beyond the kind of rugged work boots that might be expected. The line now extends, as one online shoe store proclaims, ‘from professional Steel Toe workboots to stylish slip-on comfort shoes, and everything in between’. This boast makes no mention of the steel-capped ‘work’ sneakers on offer, nor of the women’s sandals and mules.

Caterpillar Inc.’s venture into the footwear business (in partnership with Wolverine World Wide) has proved one of the most imaginative and successful brand-extension exercises in corporate history.

Although the marketing leans heavily on the Caterpillar brand, CAT Footwear is actually manufactured by Wolverine World Wide, which became sole global licensee in an agreement signed in 1994. With hindsight, the partnership made perfect sense. Caterpillar stood to benefit from Wolverine’s long experience in the footwear business: the company, founded in 1883, had introduced the world to Hush Puppies among other hit products. Wolverine, meanwhile, was shrewd enough to recognise that people want much the same things from their shoes as they do from their industrial machinery: durability and reliability.

As might be expected of a company of its size and age, Caterpillar Inc. has a rich IP history. The application for the oldest US trademark owned by the company (registration number 0079056) was filed by Benjamin Holt on 11 April 1910, some years before his firm’s decisive merger with the C.L. Best Tractor Co. It consisted of a typed drawing of the word ‘Caterpillar’, and was restricted to the use of the design on tractors and traction engines. The CAT logo familiar from the shoes and boots is registered as a UK Trademark in 21 classes (No. 1368523). The application was filed on 22 December 1988.

This article first appeared in IP Review, issue 12

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