Sales Associate, Tecovas

Its boots are traditionally made at a veteran boot factory in Léon, Mexico, with over 200 steps in the process, but Tecovas’ straight-to-consumer model allows the company to bypass middle-party retailers and knock nearly $100 off the average price points of their boots.

It’s the first company to offer this sort of model for this product, and has upended a billion-dollar industry in doing so. Its initial success has helped it to open 13 physical stores in Texas, the state with the biggest market for cowboy boots. But over 70% of Tecovas’s sales come from other states, allowing the company to essentially create new markets where other brands that only operated in brick-and-mortar stores are unable to compete.