Boulet Boots: A Portrait of Quebec’s Western Boot Pioneer

Two hours of conifers and back roads later, we arrived. A large sign proudly featuring a cowboy on horseback welcomes us to the village of Ste-Tite. We’re here to meet Louis Boulet—a meeting we’ve been anticipating for a long time.

In Canada, tanneries have nearly disappeared, and so have manufacturing companies that work with leather. But not Boulet. Now in its third generation—soon to be fourth—Boulet continues to make its Western boots from start to finish, right here in Quebec. The company was founded in 1933.

Louis welcomes us warmly into a small building where the windows are dressed with vertical blinds and the doors, covered in patchwork-style leather. Every detail reveals a piece of this place’s story.

We walk from station to station—stitching, assembly, finishing—greeting everyone by name along the way. Louis knows them all. He knows his factory like the back of his hand and takes the time to explain every detail of how a pair of boots is made. Everything is done by hand here—even the signs that mark each section of the workshop.

Louis tells us that back in his father’s time, manufacturing companies across Quebec were shutting down or moving overseas after World War II. But Boulet never left. Time seems to have stood still here. There’s a magnetism, a magic to this place—an indescribable pride in witnessing the history held within these walls.

Everything is made and assembled HERE.

The wooden floors creak beneath our feet, and as we observe the old paint marks on the ground, we can imagine the production line back when Boulet was making 300 to 400 pairs of boots a day. Not to mention the hundreds of boot molds and cutting dies accumulated over the years for every small piece of leather stitched onto every boot design. This is our heritage, our legacy, hidden in the heart of this industry in Mauricie.

Today, Boulet is the largest boot factory in Canada, producing over 200,000 boots annually. Their Western boots are sold in more than fifteen countries and are recognized by real cowboys around the world.

For a small company like ours, immersing ourselves in Boulet’s culture is deeply inspiring. The authenticity of this company reminds us that success is humble—it’s something that grows over time. That flourishes with time. That becomes beautiful with time.

 

Not the end...