How This Family Business Went Viral Using Old School Advertising

For more than a century, Red Wing Shoe Company has designed and manufactured work boots in the United States with leather sourced from its own tannery. The family-owned, privately held business, which was founded in 1905 in Red Wing, Minnesota, wanted to remind its customers of that commitment to craftsmanship, so the shoemaker decided to add some distinctive texture to its advertising.

Over the past few weeks, Red Wing unveiled two unique billboards. One of the signs, which measures 18 by 40 feet and currently sits over downtown Minneapolis, is made entirely out of wood. The other one is constructed completely from leather. Both the signs have the same message, “Made the hard way” above the company’s name and logo.

That’s more than a tagline for the shoe maker. It’s an all-encompassing strategy for how to operate a business. In that spirit, the company shared behind-the-scenes videos of the meticulous construction process that went into the billboards, showing teams of workers sawing, drilling, buffing, sanding, and nailing together the four words.

The billboards, just like the brand’s American-made work boots, were “built the hard way by hand,” said Aaron Seymour, the company’s head of brand and creative, in a post on LinkedIn that has gone viral in the span of a week. To pull off this unusual approach, Seymour said that Red Wing partnered with Wieden + Kennedy, an independent creative agency based in Portland Oregon.

This is not Red Wing’s first taste of virality. The shoemaker has a history of marketing work boots in creative ways. In 2023, the Minnesota company teamed up with Nintendo to design “a pixel-for-stitch recreation” of Mario’s rounded-heel, leather boots from The Super Mario Bros. Movie.

At the time, Dave Schneider, the company’s chief marketing officer, said of the collaboration, “We’ve been supplying long-lasting, durable and comfortable footwear that protects trades workers on the job site for 118-years. We were excited to deliver that same ambition and energy to Mario’s Boots as one of the most famous plumbers in the world.”