Inside Aussie shoemakers fight with US giant Deckers Outdoor Corporation [Video]

Uggs: they’re every bit as Australian as Tim Tams and pavlovas.

Only Tim Tams’ maker Arnott’s was absorbed into a US private equity firm in 2019, and New Zealand has been unrelenting in its claim to have originated the meringue-based dessert.

In the mid-2000s, the fleecy boot transitioned from daggy house shoe to in-demand trend donned by Hollywood celebrities, and is broadly recognised around the world as a quintessentially Australian product.

But for decades, local bootmakers have been part of a protracted David-and-Goliath legal battle with a $US31.6 billion ($50 billion) American conglomerate over the right to call ugg boots, well, ugg boots.

Earlier this week, sheepskin bootmaker Todd Watts posted a TikTok videodeclaring that his business, UGG Since 1974, had been forced to change its name in overseas markets following a Chicago lawsuit brought by US apparel and footwear giant Deckers Outdoor Corporation, which owns the UGG trademark in …