Earlier, leather was a major constituent of a shoe i.e. upper, lining, soling etc. were all made up of leather. Footwear industry started looking to other substitute material due to

• Shortage of skins and hides and its consequent high price

Substitute materials offered better properties in manufacture and wear which leather could not offer, e.g. synthetics are relatively uniform in thickness, surface and physical properties and are available in continous roll form.

• Substitute materials are cheaper to produce.

Keeping in view the abovementioned features of substitute and bottlenecks of leather , it was necessary to invent the substitute of Leather. This has lead to the invention of Thermoplastics. Polyvinylchloride (PVC) is also a thermoplastic, widely accepted substitute of leather