the Cost of Cobblers and Shoe Repair for Women's Dress Shoes

The cost is for reattaching a broken off heel to one of a pair of pumps. The shop is a full service cobbler so it offers a variety of services from polishing to leather repair to sole replacement and even fully custom shoes. Minimum cost for work is $5, and prices go up from there based on how hard it is to do the work. They also sell shoe care items like laces, polish, and shoe trees.

I broke a heel walking to work and had to switch to the tennis shoes I always bring just in case I have time to workout after work. Over lunch I called around to see who I could take the shoe to to get it fixed. It was a nice shoe. Still is now that it got fixed.

Anyway, I found a place and they were close so I walked over on my lunch break and dropped off the pair. The cobbler guy wanted the second shoe to make sure the heels were even once he was done fixing them. It wasn't a quick fix as I'd hoped, because he had a bit of a back log of work to do before he got to my heel, but it only took three days to get the shoes back, so I had them for the weekend if I needed them (I didn't, but you never can tell with these things!).

The quality of the work was excellent. They look like the heel never broke, and they were polished really good too, so they actually look better than they did before the accident. I'm happy!

I don't know why more people don't get their shoes fixed when their heels break or the soles wear out or the seams come unstitched. Shoes, good shoes at least, are still pretty expensive, and designer shoes even more so. Shoe repair is comparatively cheap compared to new shoes, even when you get a full resole on men's leather soled dress shoes ($70 for the resole, $250+ for a good replacement shoe). And the uppers are usually the last thing to go, and even when they do, they don't go all at once and a good cobbler can figure out how to replace the worn sections of shoe and refurbish the bits that are worn but not worn out.

The only exception I'd have to say is for running shoes. You might be able to resole them a few times, but the uppers just aren't that durable, and the cushioning in the midsole breaks down far too fast. For their price, they just aren't that great of a type of shoe, and you have to replace them twice a year. Ick. But it's one of those things you just have to have for running or just for comfy lazy shoes.