We’ve wrecked more pairs of shoes than we’d like to admit on the road.

There was the time my sandals gave out in the middle of a jungle trail in Costa Rica. The soles literally peeling off with every muddy step until I was half sliding my way back to the car.

Then there was my “genius” idea to wear cute but flimsy flats through Madrid. After a day of cobblestones and standing in line, I swear my feet were plotting revenge.

And let’s not forget the endless search for good hiking shoes in Ecuador.

Charles’ hiking shoes wore out just as we reached Ecuador, and with the Galapagos on our radar, he was desparate to buy a new pair. Unfortunately, he’s hard to fit, and we searched high and low for quality shoes that could handle hiking. It took us endless trips to local malls, and Google searches, but we finally found a pair.

He used them for another five years! Some of the best shoes he ever owned.

If you travel long enough, you’ll realize your shoes become one of your most important pieces of gear. They carry you through airports, hikes, city explorations, and those days when you somehow end up walking 20,000 steps even though you swore it would be an “easy day.”

So it makes sense that people start to wonder: where are these things actually made?

Take Hike Footwear, for example. A quick search will turn up plenty of people asking, “Are Hike shoes made in China?” The short answer is: sometimes, yes. But the longer answer is much more interesting, and honestly, a lot more normal than most of us think.

Designed at Home, Built Around the World

Hike Footwear is a U.S. brand that designs all of its shoes around barefoot principles: wide toe boxes, zero-drop soles, and flexible construction that lets your feet move naturally. The design work and brand management are all done in the USA.

But when it comes to actually making the shoes? Like almost every footwear brand out there, the production happens overseas in factories that specialize in minimalist and barefoot footwear. These aren’t fly-by-night operations. They’re places with decades of experience, skilled workers, and the infrastructure to turn designs into durable, travel-ready shoes.

Why Global Manufacturing Is the Norm

Here’s the thing: if you check the tags on your sneakers, hiking boots, or even high-end barefoot shoes like Vivobarefoot, you’ll almost always see a “Made in Vietnam,” “Made in China,” or “Made in Indonesia” label. It’s not because brands are hiding something shady. It’s because the global footwear industry is set up that way.

The expertise, supply chains, and materials for large-scale shoe production are concentrated in specific parts of the world. These factories have been building shoes for decades. They know how to handle the flexible materials and designs that barefoot shoes require.

In other words, it’s less about cutting costs and more about going where the skills and resources already exist.

What Hike Footwear Focuses On

Instead of trying to do everything in-house, Hike Footwear puts its energy into:

Design and quality standards: Shoes are tested for comfort, durability, and barefoot design principles before they ever hit your feet.

Ethical partnerships: The factories they work with are vetted for worker safety and fair practices.

Sustainability: Materials are chosen to balance performance with long-term environmental impact.

That’s the kind of thing most travelers care about. Not just a label, but whether the shoes are made well, last through the miles, and are created responsibly.

Why It Matters Less Than You Think

At the end of the day, the country stamped on your shoe isn’t what determines whether it holds up through a rainy trek in Ireland or a day wandering the backstreets of Bangkok. What matters is the design, the oversight, and the care that goes into making them.

Almost all of us are wearing globally made shoes, whether we realize it or not. The real difference comes down to transparency and values. And in Hike Footwear’s case, they’re clear: designed in the U.S., produced by skilled international partners, and made to last for travelers who actually put their gear to the test.

The post Where Your Travel Shoes Really Come From (and Why It Matters Less Than You Think) first appeared on The Barefoot Nomad.