GRS FOOTWEAR - Key Persons
George Edward Rye was succeeded by his son Edward Rye who joined the business in 1924 and worked at the Company up until a few years before his passing away in 1992. Edward managed to steer the Company through the disastrous year of 1963 when over 1/3 of the Companies customers were forced to close. A combination of one of the harshest winters on record, plus the huge popularity of the fashionable and almost un-repairable ‘crepe' sole, closed hundreds of shoe repairers across the UK.
The Company passed through the family & still remains in the ownership of the Rye family, making its' way through 5 generations and surviving two world wars, where staff and family members were called into serving their Country, through the years of rationing, material shortages and several economic depressions.
In 1964, the current Chairman Michael Rye joined the business and soon began wholesaling footwear as well as materials - originally sourced from UK, then European factories, and the biggest expansion period in the history of the Company began. This side of the business grew quickly and in 1983, the Company moved to a much bigger industrial unit in the city away from the 5 floor warehouse in the Groat Market which was becoming too difficult to work in. The original premises were then converted into a retail business. In 1992, Martin Rye, the 5th generation of the family joined the business.