Betsy Lobb (15 November 1868 – 9 December 1956) was the British owner and managing director of

John Lobb Bootmaker John Lobb Bootmaker is a business that manufactures and retails a luxury brand of shoes and boots, mainly for men but also for women. Leather goods such as wallets and belts are also available. Founded in 1849 by John Lobb (1829–95), the b ...

a royal warranted maker of bespoke boots and shoes in London and Paris.

Life

Lobb was born on Forder farm in

South Brent South Brent is a large village on the southern edge of Dartmoor, England, in the valley of the River Avon. The parish includes the small hamlets of Aish, Harbourneford, Lutton, Brent Mill, and many scattered farmhouses. It is five miles (8& ...

in Devon in 1868. Her parents were John and Ellen (born Callard) Smerdon. She worked in a small hotel in London where she was the manager. She married William Hunter Lobb who trained as a bootmaker. He was the heir and second son of

John Lobb John Lobb (27 December 1829 – 17 January 1895) was an English shoemaker and the founder of the companies John Lobb Bootmaker and John Lobb Limited. He founded his first successful company making boots for gold diggers in Australia. Early life J ...

. William oversaw the expanding business that his father had started opening a shop in Paris in 1901 and a second unsuccessful premises in Regent Street in 1904. Betsy would run the shoe business after her husband died in 1916. The business was unusual as it had failed to mechanise and shoes were manufactured by hand. The clientele were rich and they enjoyed a royal warrant. Betsy inherited the business and profits were falling. She appointed a manager and moved to Brighton. Her organisation of the business raised her share capital from £7,500 to £17,000 at the end of the war when she returned to the family home in St John's Wood. She had four sons and three survived to adulthood. The business was not doing well and she took in lodgers to raise money to pay for education or Eric who went to

Oxford University The University of Oxford is a collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the second-oldest continuously operating u ...

. The business survived the second world war after Eric returned to the business. Her eldest son, "Mr Will", who had trained as bootmaker was drafted into the Ministry of Information. Notably Eric escaped the draft and remained a civilian. The firm's premises was bombed six times and eventually destroyed, but other premises were found nearby. She and her son's, Eric and William, ran the company as equal partners. Lobb died in 1956 at her home in

Radlett Radlett is a large village in Hertfordshire, England, between Elstree and St Albans on Watling Street, with a population of 10,060. It is in the council district of Hertsmere in the south of the county, and forms part of the civil parish of A ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lobb, Betsy 1868 births 1956 deaths Businesspeople from Devon 20th-century British businesswomen