Silver Cup Award Winners

OVERVIEW l CONTEST HISTORY l PAST WINNERS

Would you like to earn a unique award to help your shop stand out above the rest? Chuck Bolinger started entering SSIA's Silver Cup competition in 1982. He won an Eastern Silver Cup in 1984.

Knowing he does quality work and ready for the contest challenge, he entered again in 2005 and won the industry's ultimate prize. Winning the Silver Cup improved his business in 2006, making it the best business year he ever had. 2007 was also a great year for business, especially when customers continued to congratulate him on his awards. Several newspapers published articles about the awards. A local TV station also did a story about it. That made winning even better.

Finding the right shoe might be as simple as asking a customer to borrow a pair by offering him frees soles and heels in return. Visit your local Goodwill stores and thrift shops. This year's contest only requires two pairs of men’s shoes.

One of the nice things about entering the contest is when your shoes are returned to you, you also receive the score sheets the judges used when grading your work. This information will be very helpful to compliment the great work you do and highlight areas that might need a little more attention. It is a nice conversation piece when talking to other winners and getting their thoughts about you repair work.

Chuck has his Silver Cup in full view of his customers. He also uses a picture of the cup on all of his business cards and advertisements. He displays his winning shoes so his customers can see the true art involved and his talented work. Chuck has also received many plaques for other competitions in our industry. They are also displayed (see photo below).

You can visit Chuck’s shop:

Chuck's Foot Support
4546 Maplecrest Road
Ft. Wayne, IN 46835

Competing is very important, and to be recognized for your achievements in this class of repairers is a wonderful accomplishment. Everyone talks about promoting and making shoe repair more visible. Winning the Silver Cup will instantly do this for you. Each time a town, city or state has a new winner, that part of the country becomes more aware of what we do as a whole. It is a perfect opportunity to remind our future customers that shoe repair is still here, alive and well.

If we can all buy more and use more goods, everybody wins-- the wholesalers because we will need to buy more products and suppliers of the materials and products we use.

If you would like to enter this year’s competition, please print this form.