DR. W.M. SCHOLL TOOK THE PAIN OUT OF WALKING FOR US ALL

Dr. Scholl foot products are as famous as any brand name today, in fact rivaling McDonald’s, GE, Microsoft, and more. Oddly enough, this doctor never had a medical practice, but he still had a huge effect on public health in America, forever revolutionizing foot care. Scholl was born in 1882 in rural Indiana. His grandfather had been a shoemaker in Germany, and young Billy borrowed his tools to repair his own shoes, eventually becoming the family cobbler. At 18, he left for Chicago and began working at Ruppert's, a downtown shoe retailer.

As his medical acumen grew, Scholl started tinkering with foot-care devices. In 1904, at age 22, he patented a mechanical arch support called a Foot-Eazer. Scholl continued to develop new products--anti-corn pads, cushion insoles, exercise sandals, orthopedic shoes--and novel ways of selling them. Realizing that shoe salesmen were his foot soldiers, so to speak, he offered them podiatric correspondence courses, promising higher commissions for clerks who understood their customers' feet.

After earning his first $1 million year in 1915, he sponsored a Cinderella Foot Contest the next year. His business philosophy, "Early to bed, early to rise, work like hell, and advertise," was catchy and it helped his company to grow at a tremendous rate. He had certainly found a need that was very underserved and filled it with quality products. He also cut out the middleman by opening hundreds of Dr. Scholl's Foot Comfort Shops. By 1955 the Dr. Scholl Co. had 16 manufacturing plants, and "Dr. Scholl's" had become the world's third-best-known brand name. Scholl died in 1968, having developed more than 1,000 foot-care products and a $77 million company. It was acquired in 1979 by Schering-Plough, where it's now a $290-million-a-year business. Almost everyone that walks has feet problems at one time or another and we thank the good doctor for the relief he has broght us.