Teva, one of the leading sandal manufacturers in the market today, was founded and is owned by Mark Thatcher. When he was working in the Grand Canyon as a rafting guide, he saw that most of the boatmen there wore hiking or athletic shoes in the river and he himself used to wear flip flops or thongs.

Both types of footwear have drawbacks as athletic shoes or hiking shoes got wet easily and the feet of the wearers got fungus and gravel while thongs or flip flops got off the wearer’s foot while running.

After spending some time, Mark Thatcher designed a sandal in which nylon ankle strap was used to support the feet of the wearer, although the shape of the shoe was just like a thong. Luckily, Velcro material also came up during the same period when was looking for an option for thongs. He used Velcro to strap around the ankles so that the sandal remained bound to the wearer’s feet. After making this sample, he realized that he did not have enough finances to start manufacturing these sandals and thus, he needed to search for a manufacturer to produce his sandals.

In the first year of their production, he succeeded in selling only 200 pairs designed by him. This was because many people complained about the thong style straps of the shoes while some got blisters in between their 1st and 2nd toes due to the straps. In the following year, youngsters of America noticed these sandals as fashionable footwear and their sales increased over night.

In the same time, Mark Thatcher became partners with Deckers Corporation and finally, Deckers also achieved exclusive rights to Tevas along with their patents for basic design. They also received Tevas trademark as a brand name.

In 1988, the sandals were further re-designed and a new strapping system was developed by Deckers which gave birth to Hurricane, the first model in this line of production. This new strapping system consisted of 3 parts: the toe post, the heel strap and the side strap. The design of Hurricane serves as the basic design for all the Teva sandals produced today.

All the sandals produced by Teva today are very comfortable to wear and are free from causing any foot related problems for the wearer. The soles of these sandals are harder and thus, they provide better grip to the wearer while walking on wet surfaces and even while in water.

Check out the best designs for birkenstock sandals and yellow box flip flops. Get a totally unique version of this article from our article submission service