Tomáš Bata
Encyclopedia
Tomáš Baťa (ˈtomaːʃ ˈbaca) (3 April 1876 Zlín
, Moravia
– 12 July 1932) was a Czech entrepreneur, founder of Bata Shoes
company, one of the world's biggest multinational
retailers, manufacturers and distributors of footwear
and accessories.
on 24 August 1894 with 800 Austrian gulden, some $320, inherited from his mother. His brother Antonín Baťa and sister Anna were partners in the startup firm T. & A. Bata Shoe Company. Though the organization was newly established, the family had a long history of shoemaking
, spanning eight generations and over three hundred years. This heritage helped boost the popularity of his new firm very quickly. In 1904 Baťa worked on an assembly line
in the United States
and brought his acquaintance with the method back to Zlín. With modern production and long distance retailing, Baťa modernized the shoemaking industry and the company surged ahead in production and profits right from its nascent years.
Eventually, Tomas Baťa obtained sole control over the company in 1908 after his brother Antonín Baťa died from tuberculosis. After Antonin's death, Tomas brought into the company two of his younger brothers, Jan and Bohus into the business. World War I
created a booming demand for military shoes, and the company quickly became one of the major contemporary footwear brands. During the interwar period Tomas Baťa again visited the New World to observe progress at the River Rouge Plant
in Dearborn, Michigan
. Upon his return the company began to look towards decentralizing operations. Baťa also exhibited his business acumen, with his initiatives towards producing low-cost shoes for the general public, whose purchasing power had been significantly reduced in the aftermath of the war. Factories and companies were set up in other countries including Poland
, Yugoslavia
, India
, the Netherlands
, Denmark
, the United Kingdom
and the United States
. These factories were made self-sufficient and autonomous in their design, production and distribution strategies, in a move to focus them towards catering to the local population. By the early 1930s, under Tomas Bata's leadership the Baťa enterprise and Czechoslovakia
were the world's leading footwear exporters. Tomas and his brother Jan together were responsible for the design of the Bata industrial system.. Although Tomas has been better promoted for the development of the Bata System, Jan's contributions were equal to those of his brother Tomas. For example, under Jan's administration in Zlin, he developed built more square meters of buildings than under Tomas' time.
Czech Republic:
1. Zlin (Tomas and Jan Bata)
Bata cities and factories built under first ten years of Jan Antonin Bata's administration below:
2. Otrokovice – Batov, Czech(1930–1934),
3. Trebíc, Czech (1933),
4. Slovakia Bata Canal 60 Kilometers (1935)
5. Nové Zámky (1935),
6. Zruc nad Sázavou (1938),
7. Sezimovo Ústí (1939)
Slovakia:
8. Bošany, Slovakia (1931–1934) [factory and small colony]
9. SVIT, Slovakia (1934)
10. Liptovský sv. Mikuláš, (1938) [factory and small colony]
11. Batovany (today Partizánske, 1938)
Europe:
12. Best The Netherlands, (1933–1934)
13. East Tilbury (England, 1933–1934)
14. Hellocourt , France, (1933–1935)
15. Vernon, France (1935)
16. Neuvic, Dordogne, France (1939)
17. Belgium (1937)
18. Borovo, Croatia (1931–1935)
19. Möhlin, Switzerland (1933)
20. Chelmek, Poland (1932)
21. Martfü, Hungary (1941)
Outside Europe:
India - In 1931, Tomas Bata, the Czech shoe tycoon, established his first Indian operation at Konnagar. By 1936 the Konnegar plan was phased out. In May 1931, Tomas sold his business interests to his brother Jan Antonin Bata who established Batanagar, Bata's first permanent shoe factory in India. The company first established itself in India in 1931 by renting a building to start an experimental shoe production plant in Konnagar, West Bengal with 75 Czech experts. It was Jan Antonin Bata’s administration that designed, developed and built the industrial city called Batanagar in 1934. Jan Bata also build factories in Digha near Patna, and elsewhere in India, employing more than 7,000 people. Batanagar, under Jan Bata's ideals became one of the bigger suburban towns near Kolkata.
22. Batanagar (India 1934-1935)
23. Belcamp, Maryland USA, (1936–1939)
24. Batawa, Canada (1938–1939), founded by Jan Antonin Bata and taken over by Tomas J. Bata.
Brazil:
25. Batatuba (1939)
26. Mariapolis, Brazil (1941)
27. Bataguassu (1953)
28. Nova Andradina (1958)
29. Município de Anaurilândia (1963)
30. Município de Batayporã (1963)
Other Bata factories:
Boucherieth, Syria (1934)
Iraq, Baghdad, (1934)
Klang, Malaya (1935)
Mansurieh (suburb of Alexandria), Egypt (1936)
Gwelo formerly Rhodesia, later Modrat, Zimbabwe, (1937)
Indonesia (1938),
Peru, Lima (1939)
Chile, Batafler (1939)
Java Island, Batavia Kalibata (1939)
Kenya, Nairobi/Limuru (1939)
Pakistan, Lahore (1939)
Morocco, Casablanca (1939)
Belgian Congo (1940)
Bolivia, Quillacollo (1940)
Senegal, Dakar French West Africa (1940)
Guatemala (1940)
Haiti, Port au Prince (1940)
Vietnam, Haiphong (1940)
Philippines (1940)
Bata factory in Digha near Patna, India
Baťa was regarded as an advocate of Taylorism, functionalism
and a proponent of many aspects of the Garden city movement
. Tomas Bata is credited with efforts to modernize his hometown providing the people with employment, and housing facilities, making him a very popular citizen in the town. He also became the mayor of Zlín. Tomas Baťa is also widely regarded as a businessman with an acute sense of social consciousness. He is quoted by many as one of the first pioneers of employee welfare and social advancement programs.
Tomáš Baťa stated:
took over ownership of the Bata companies and eventually fled to the United States
due to the Nazi occupation in 1939, and later settled in Brazil.
Tomas' son Thomas J. Bata anticipating the second world war along with over 100 families from Czechoslovakia moved to Canada in 1939 to develop the Bata Shoe Company of Canada centered in a town that still bears his name, Batawa, Ontario.
The Second World war saw many Bata businesses in Europe and the Far East destroyed. After the Second World War, the core business enterprise in Czechoslovakia and other major enterprises in Central and Eastern Europe were nationalized by the Communist governments. Thomas devoted himself to the rebuilding and growth of the Bata Shoe Organization together with his wife and partner Sonja. He successfully spearheaded ethical and innovative expansion into new markets throughout Asia, the Middle East, Africa and Latin America. Under his leadership the Bata Shoe Organization experienced unprecedented growth and became the world's largest manufacturer and marketer of footwear selling over 300 million pairs of shoes each year and employing over 80,000 people.
states:
When I first began this paper, I intended to demonstrate that what Baťa did is a superb illustration of what is now called "quality management". The record shows that Tomáš Baťa did indeed precede modern "quality management" practices by at least half a century. If we look only at that side of the man, we must conclude that he was the first to use quality as a way to lower cost at the same time as he created customer delight.
However, as I delved more deeply into Baťa's management methods, it became clear that looking at his work through such a lens gives much too narrow a focus. It is possible, of course, to analyze Baťa's work as an example of what W. Edwards Deming
has called his "System of Profound Knowledge". However, the level of abstraction at which Dr. Deming describes this system makes it capable of encompassing many different activities and while it provides great generality, it does not provide a focus on what was unique about Baťa. I have chosen a less abstract approach, concentrating on the Baťa contributions I thought would be of greatest value in contemporary management. My objective is to find the most important lessons that the Baťa system of management can teach today's entrepreneurs.
Wages scheme
Tomáš Baťa used 4 basic types of wages:
Also typical is so called "Baťa price" used to give a price ended almost always by number nine. Basically meaning that a price 99 or 19.99 looks apparently much better than rounded number such as 100 or 20, even though the difference is just 1 currency unit.
Aviation
For Tomáš Baťa aviation was another branch of activity - his company was apparently the world's first one to regularly use aircraft for expedient transport of not only high-echelon staff, but in case of need also e.g. skilled workers to places where their skills were needed soon - so the primary aim was the timely deployment of manpower to the spot where it was needed, not creating luxurious "royal barges" for a few chosen. His brother Jan A. Bata founded the famous Zlin aircraft works two years after Tomáš Baťa's death, starting with simple gliders, but offering, in the thirties to the eve of the WWII, several sophisticated types (e.g. the powered Zlin Z-XII, widely exported, and the Z-XIII, as well as some successful sailplanes) and even aero engines. The Moravan - Zlin factory is the direct descendant of Jan Bata's Czech aviation legacy.
a communist writer portrayed Tomáš Baťa as a strong willed dictator who sacrificed himself and all people around for success of the company. After being published, Jan Bata, sued for defamation and tried to stop further publishing. In 1954, Turek's novel was turned into a movie of the same name, made by director K.M. Walló.
Zlín
Zlín , from 1949 to 1989 Gottwaldov , is a city in the Zlín Region, southeastern Moravia, Czech Republic, on the Dřevnice River. The development of the modern city is closely connected to the Bata Shoes company...
, Moravia
Moravia
Moravia is a historical region in Central Europe in the east of the Czech Republic, and one of the former Czech lands, together with Bohemia and Silesia. It takes its name from the Morava River which rises in the northwest of the region...
– 12 July 1932) was a Czech entrepreneur, founder of Bata Shoes
Bata Shoes
Bata Shoes is a large, family owned shoe company based in Bermuda but currently headquartered in Lausanne, Switzerland, operating 3 business units worldwide – Bata Metro Markets, Bata Emerging Markets and Bata Branded Business. It has a retail presence in over 50 countries and production...
company, one of the world's biggest multinational
Multinational corporation
A multi national corporation or enterprise , is a corporation or an enterprise that manages production or delivers services in more than one country. It can also be referred to as an international corporation...
retailers, manufacturers and distributors of footwear
Footwear
Footwear consists of garments worn on the feet, for fashion, protection against the environment, and adornment. Being barefoot is commonly associated with poverty, but some cultures chose not to wear footwear at least in some situations....
and accessories.
Career
Tomáš Baťa established the organization in ZlínZlín
Zlín , from 1949 to 1989 Gottwaldov , is a city in the Zlín Region, southeastern Moravia, Czech Republic, on the Dřevnice River. The development of the modern city is closely connected to the Bata Shoes company...
on 24 August 1894 with 800 Austrian gulden, some $320, inherited from his mother. His brother Antonín Baťa and sister Anna were partners in the startup firm T. & A. Bata Shoe Company. Though the organization was newly established, the family had a long history of shoemaking
Shoemaking
Shoemaking is the process of making footwear. Originally, shoes were made one at a time by hand. Traditional handicraft shoemaking has now been largely superseded in volume of shoes produced by industrial mass production of footwear, but not necessarily in quality, attention to detail, or...
, spanning eight generations and over three hundred years. This heritage helped boost the popularity of his new firm very quickly. In 1904 Baťa worked on an assembly line
Assembly line
An assembly line is a manufacturing process in which parts are added to a product in a sequential manner using optimally planned logistics to create a finished product much faster than with handcrafting-type methods...
in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
and brought his acquaintance with the method back to Zlín. With modern production and long distance retailing, Baťa modernized the shoemaking industry and the company surged ahead in production and profits right from its nascent years.
Eventually, Tomas Baťa obtained sole control over the company in 1908 after his brother Antonín Baťa died from tuberculosis. After Antonin's death, Tomas brought into the company two of his younger brothers, Jan and Bohus into the business. World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
created a booming demand for military shoes, and the company quickly became one of the major contemporary footwear brands. During the interwar period Tomas Baťa again visited the New World to observe progress at the River Rouge Plant
River Rouge Plant
The Ford River Rouge Complex is a Ford Motor Company automobile factory complex located in Dearborn, Michigan, along the Rouge River, upstream from its confluence with the Detroit River at Zug Island...
in Dearborn, Michigan
Dearborn, Michigan
-Economy:Ford Motor Company has its world headquarters in Dearborn. In addition its Dearborn campus contains many research, testing, finance and some production facilities. Ford Land controls the numerous properties owned by Ford including sales and leasing to unrelated businesses such as the...
. Upon his return the company began to look towards decentralizing operations. Baťa also exhibited his business acumen, with his initiatives towards producing low-cost shoes for the general public, whose purchasing power had been significantly reduced in the aftermath of the war. Factories and companies were set up in other countries including Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
, Yugoslavia
Kingdom of Yugoslavia
The Kingdom of Yugoslavia was a state stretching from the Western Balkans to Central Europe which existed during the often-tumultuous interwar era of 1918–1941...
, India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
, the Netherlands
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
, Denmark
Denmark
Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...
, the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
and the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. These factories were made self-sufficient and autonomous in their design, production and distribution strategies, in a move to focus them towards catering to the local population. By the early 1930s, under Tomas Bata's leadership the Baťa enterprise and Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...
were the world's leading footwear exporters. Tomas and his brother Jan together were responsible for the design of the Bata industrial system.. Although Tomas has been better promoted for the development of the Bata System, Jan's contributions were equal to those of his brother Tomas. For example, under Jan's administration in Zlin, he developed built more square meters of buildings than under Tomas' time.
Czech Republic:
1. Zlin (Tomas and Jan Bata)
Bata cities and factories built under first ten years of Jan Antonin Bata's administration below:
2. Otrokovice – Batov, Czech(1930–1934),
3. Trebíc, Czech (1933),
4. Slovakia Bata Canal 60 Kilometers (1935)
5. Nové Zámky (1935),
6. Zruc nad Sázavou (1938),
7. Sezimovo Ústí (1939)
Slovakia:
8. Bošany, Slovakia (1931–1934) [factory and small colony]
9. SVIT, Slovakia (1934)
10. Liptovský sv. Mikuláš, (1938) [factory and small colony]
11. Batovany (today Partizánske, 1938)
Europe:
12. Best The Netherlands, (1933–1934)
13. East Tilbury (England, 1933–1934)
14. Hellocourt , France, (1933–1935)
15. Vernon, France (1935)
16. Neuvic, Dordogne, France (1939)
17. Belgium (1937)
18. Borovo, Croatia (1931–1935)
19. Möhlin, Switzerland (1933)
20. Chelmek, Poland (1932)
21. Martfü, Hungary (1941)
Outside Europe:
India - In 1931, Tomas Bata, the Czech shoe tycoon, established his first Indian operation at Konnagar. By 1936 the Konnegar plan was phased out. In May 1931, Tomas sold his business interests to his brother Jan Antonin Bata who established Batanagar, Bata's first permanent shoe factory in India. The company first established itself in India in 1931 by renting a building to start an experimental shoe production plant in Konnagar, West Bengal with 75 Czech experts. It was Jan Antonin Bata’s administration that designed, developed and built the industrial city called Batanagar in 1934. Jan Bata also build factories in Digha near Patna, and elsewhere in India, employing more than 7,000 people. Batanagar, under Jan Bata's ideals became one of the bigger suburban towns near Kolkata.
22. Batanagar (India 1934-1935)
23. Belcamp, Maryland USA, (1936–1939)
24. Batawa, Canada (1938–1939), founded by Jan Antonin Bata and taken over by Tomas J. Bata.
Brazil:
25. Batatuba (1939)
26. Mariapolis, Brazil (1941)
27. Bataguassu (1953)
28. Nova Andradina (1958)
29. Município de Anaurilândia (1963)
30. Município de Batayporã (1963)
Other Bata factories:
Boucherieth, Syria (1934)
Iraq, Baghdad, (1934)
Klang, Malaya (1935)
Mansurieh (suburb of Alexandria), Egypt (1936)
Gwelo formerly Rhodesia, later Modrat, Zimbabwe, (1937)
Indonesia (1938),
Peru, Lima (1939)
Chile, Batafler (1939)
Java Island, Batavia Kalibata (1939)
Kenya, Nairobi/Limuru (1939)
Pakistan, Lahore (1939)
Morocco, Casablanca (1939)
Belgian Congo (1940)
Bolivia, Quillacollo (1940)
Senegal, Dakar French West Africa (1940)
Guatemala (1940)
Haiti, Port au Prince (1940)
Vietnam, Haiphong (1940)
Philippines (1940)
Bata factory in Digha near Patna, India
Baťa was regarded as an advocate of Taylorism, functionalism
Functionalism (architecture)
Functionalism, in architecture, is the principle that architects should design a building based on the purpose of that building. This statement is less self-evident than it first appears, and is a matter of confusion and controversy within the profession, particularly in regard to modern...
and a proponent of many aspects of the Garden city movement
Garden city movement
The garden city movement is a method of urban planning that was initiated in 1898 by Sir Ebenezer Howard in the United Kingdom. Garden cities were intended to be planned, self-contained communities surrounded by "greenbelts" , containing proportionate areas of residences, industry and...
. Tomas Bata is credited with efforts to modernize his hometown providing the people with employment, and housing facilities, making him a very popular citizen in the town. He also became the mayor of Zlín. Tomas Baťa is also widely regarded as a businessman with an acute sense of social consciousness. He is quoted by many as one of the first pioneers of employee welfare and social advancement programs.
Tomáš Baťa stated:
- "Let's bear in mind that the chances to multiply wealth are unlimited. All people can become rich. There is an error in our understandings - that all people cannot become equally rich. Wealth can not exist where the people are busy with mutual cheating, have no time for creating values and wealth. It is remarkable that we can find the greatest number of wealthy tradesmen and a population on a high standard of living in countries with a high level of business morality. On the other hand, we can find poor tradesmen and entrepreneurs and an impoverished population in countries with a low standard of business morality. This is natural because these people concentrate on cheating one another instead of trying to create value.
We are granting you the profit share not because we feel a need to give money to the people just out of the goodness of the heart. No, we are aiming at other goals by this step. By this measure we want to reach a further decrease of production costs. We want to reach the situation that the shoes are cheaper and workers earn even more. We think that our products are still too expensive and worker's salary too low."
Subsequent history of the company
Tomáš Baťa died in a plane crash (Junkers J13 D1608) in 1932 near the Zlín airport, trying to fly to Möhlin in Switzerland on a business trip under bad weather conditions (dense local fog). After his demise, his half-brother Jan Antonín BaťaJan Antonín Bata
Jan Antonín Baťa was a Czech shoe manufacturer from Uherské Hradiště , brother of Tomáš Baťa....
took over ownership of the Bata companies and eventually fled to the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
due to the Nazi occupation in 1939, and later settled in Brazil.
Tomas' son Thomas J. Bata anticipating the second world war along with over 100 families from Czechoslovakia moved to Canada in 1939 to develop the Bata Shoe Company of Canada centered in a town that still bears his name, Batawa, Ontario.
The Second World war saw many Bata businesses in Europe and the Far East destroyed. After the Second World War, the core business enterprise in Czechoslovakia and other major enterprises in Central and Eastern Europe were nationalized by the Communist governments. Thomas devoted himself to the rebuilding and growth of the Bata Shoe Organization together with his wife and partner Sonja. He successfully spearheaded ethical and innovative expansion into new markets throughout Asia, the Middle East, Africa and Latin America. Under his leadership the Bata Shoe Organization experienced unprecedented growth and became the world's largest manufacturer and marketer of footwear selling over 300 million pairs of shoes each year and employing over 80,000 people.
Baťa's leadership for quality and innovation
In a scholarly study of Tomáš Baťa as a leader and business innovator Dr. Myron TribusMyron Tribus
Myron T. Tribus was the director of the Center for Advanced Engineering Study at MIT. He headed the center when it published W. Edwards Deming's book, Out of the Crisis, and became a leading supporter and interpreter of W. Edwards Deming...
states:
When I first began this paper, I intended to demonstrate that what Baťa did is a superb illustration of what is now called "quality management". The record shows that Tomáš Baťa did indeed precede modern "quality management" practices by at least half a century. If we look only at that side of the man, we must conclude that he was the first to use quality as a way to lower cost at the same time as he created customer delight.
However, as I delved more deeply into Baťa's management methods, it became clear that looking at his work through such a lens gives much too narrow a focus. It is possible, of course, to analyze Baťa's work as an example of what W. Edwards Deming
W. Edwards Deming
William Edwards Deming was an American statistician, professor, author, lecturer and consultant. He is perhaps best known for his work in Japan...
has called his "System of Profound Knowledge". However, the level of abstraction at which Dr. Deming describes this system makes it capable of encompassing many different activities and while it provides great generality, it does not provide a focus on what was unique about Baťa. I have chosen a less abstract approach, concentrating on the Baťa contributions I thought would be of greatest value in contemporary management. My objective is to find the most important lessons that the Baťa system of management can teach today's entrepreneurs.
Wages scheme
Tomáš Baťa used 4 basic types of wages:
- Fixed rate - paid to a technical-operative and an administrative staff
- Individual order based rate - paid out to some manufacture specialists
- Collective task rate - defined for manufacture labour
- Profit contribution rate - received by operational managers
Also typical is so called "Baťa price" used to give a price ended almost always by number nine. Basically meaning that a price 99 or 19.99 looks apparently much better than rounded number such as 100 or 20, even though the difference is just 1 currency unit.
Aviation
For Tomáš Baťa aviation was another branch of activity - his company was apparently the world's first one to regularly use aircraft for expedient transport of not only high-echelon staff, but in case of need also e.g. skilled workers to places where their skills were needed soon - so the primary aim was the timely deployment of manpower to the spot where it was needed, not creating luxurious "royal barges" for a few chosen. His brother Jan A. Bata founded the famous Zlin aircraft works two years after Tomáš Baťa's death, starting with simple gliders, but offering, in the thirties to the eve of the WWII, several sophisticated types (e.g. the powered Zlin Z-XII, widely exported, and the Z-XIII, as well as some successful sailplanes) and even aero engines. The Moravan - Zlin factory is the direct descendant of Jan Bata's Czech aviation legacy.
In fiction
Novel Botostroj, 1933 (The Shoe-Machine) by Svatopluk TurekSvatopluk Turek
Svatopluk Turek was a Czech novelist, known under pen name T. Svatopluk.After studying arts at the university he worked as graphics designer in Baťa company in Zlín....
a communist writer portrayed Tomáš Baťa as a strong willed dictator who sacrificed himself and all people around for success of the company. After being published, Jan Bata, sued for defamation and tried to stop further publishing. In 1954, Turek's novel was turned into a movie of the same name, made by director K.M. Walló.
External links
- Bata topics bibliography, biography of Tomáš Baťa and contemporary photos
- at www.bata.com/
- Lessons from Tomáš Baťa for the Modern Day Manager by Myron TribusMyron TribusMyron T. Tribus was the director of the Center for Advanced Engineering Study at MIT. He headed the center when it published W. Edwards Deming's book, Out of the Crisis, and became a leading supporter and interpreter of W. Edwards Deming...
- Bata-ville: We are not afraid of the future - a British film about Baťa ideals seen through the eyes of past and present employees, as they travel to the company's heartland of Zlin.
- Principles of the Baťa Management System I didn't know how to make the link in "Notes" active to point to the PDF, so I entered it here)
- Forests and Estates of Tomas Bata