‘It’s a way of buying influence’: The billionaires acquiring Australia’s most iconic brands

by Admin
August 9, 2024

As they stepped aboard the luxury yacht, about to set sail on the Seine, it wasn’t our Olympians’ hard-won medals glinting in the setting sun — it was their golden footwear.

The exclusive soiree had been organised by the billionaire backer of Australia’s swimming team, Gina Rinehart, and along with their invitation to attend was a request to wear the Rossi boots she had gifted them.

Founded in Adelaide in 1910, the heritage branded working boot is the latest acquisition of Rinehart’s cattle company S. Kidman and Co, which also counts Driza-Bone oilskin jackets among its stable of brands.

Sailing past Parisian landmarks, Australia’s Olympians became walking advertisements for the boot Rinehart purchased for an undisclosed sum in December, demonstrating her “commitment to preserving iconic national brands”.

Gina Rinehart and Australia’s Olympic medallists posed for photos in their gold Rossi boots, on their cruise along the Seine River. (Supplied: Gina Rinehart)

“Acquiring Rossi Boots is not just a business decision; it’s a recognition of our national history,” Rinehart said at the time.

“We are pleased to add this iconic brand to our growing portfolio.”

This pursuit into Australian apparel has, once again, put Rinehart in competition with fellow billionaire mining magnate Andrew “Twiggy” Forrest.

Forrest snapped up another iconic boot brand, RM Williams, for $190 million in 2020, followed by the hatmaker Akubra in late 2023.

There’s no love lost between the rich listers, who both spent much of their early lives in the red dirt of the West Australian outback and went on to make their fortunes in mining.

But this latest battle is about more than boots — it’s about power and influence.

Gina Rinehart was front and centre watching the Australians in the pool at the Olympics in Paris, alongside Dawn Fraser and Swimming Queensland director Jeff Winnington. (Supplied: Gina Rinehart)

Boots ‘a way of buying influence’

Through her company’s sartorial acquisitions, Rinehart’s reach — particularly into the conservative side of politics — is on public display.

At $250 a pop, Rossis are about half the price of a pair of RM Williams, and are typically worn by workers on mining and construction sites.

RMs, however, are the boot of choice for most male federal politicians, including the prime minister (you only have to tune into Question Time to see the row of leather boots on the frontbenches).

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has long been an RM Williams man, but more recently has been stepping out in Rossi boots.

He even paid a special visit to the Rossi Boots stall at Beef Week in Rockhampton in May, following what his office termed an RM’s ‘blow out’ at the event, going on to proudly display his pair (a more classic brown, rather than gold) alongside S. Kidman and Co. CEO and former Northern Territory chief minister, Adam Giles.

Dutton also brought them onto the world stage when he travelled to Israel earlier this month and was snapped sitting beside President Isaac Herzog, with Rossi’s recognisable red tab peeking out.

At Beef Week in May, and in Israel earlier this month, Dutton was spotted in his Rossi boots.(Supplied)

It’s a “form of homage” according to Brand Agency CEO Steve Harris, who says Dutton has a “well-known” allegiance to Rinehart.

Indeed, Dutton – who reportedly made an overnight dash to Perth to make a brief appearance at the mining magnate’s 70th birthday bash in February – has described Rinehart as “a dear friend” and a “great Australian”.

“He’s certainly trying to establish a close relationship for financial purposes, for donation purposes, so it’s probably a strange way of buying influence,” Harris says.

“But if he was wearing a competitor’s boot, I’m sure she would ask — and probably has asked — ‘Why aren’t you wearing my product?'”

Dutton has described Rinehart as a friend, and has attended several events organised by the mining magnate. He appeared in a promotional video for Hancock Prospecting’s national mining day last year.(YouTube: Hancock Prospecting)

Dutton isn’t the only federal politician sporting Rinehart’s brands.

Scan Pauline Hanson’s socials and you’ll find a promotion for “a massive 20 per cent discount off Rossi Boots and Drizabone” for the month of May. Rinehart had attended a One Nation fundraiser, as the guest of honour, a few months earlier.

And there appears to be a political tone to these fashion allegiances.

Barnaby Joyce ditched his RMs over renewables

Climate and energy policy is perhaps where Rinehart’s footprint has most left its mark.

A long-time proponent of nuclear power, Rinehart has questioned the cost of reaching net zero emissions by 2050 and labelled wind turbines “bird-killing wind generators”.

Forrest, on the other hand, owns Squadron Energy, one of Australia’s biggest renewables companies (building wind turbines at scale), and promotes clean energy with an almost evangelical zeal.

It’s probably for this reason that Forrest struggles to get a face-to-face meeting with Dutton when he’s in Canberra.

Some Nationals have become wary of renewables, and Forrest’s ambitious plans, objecting to their own government offering subsidies to the billionaire’s green hydrogen venture during the 2022 election campaign.

Now in Opposition, the Coalition has adopted nuclear as part of its energy policy, and within the party, you’ll find no bigger opponent to the expansion of large-scale renewables in the regions than the Member for New England, Barnaby Joyce.

“[Forrest] is putting swindle factories or so-called wind farms all over our area,” Joyce told radio station 2GB in May.

“I don’t mind him as a person but these wind farms, swindle factories … they’re just killing us out in the country.”

Joyce is also a close friend of Rinehart’s.

He’s now let his boots do the talking, replacing the RMs he was wearing just last year, with a pair of American-owned Ariat cowboy boots.

Barnaby Joyce pictured in Question Time, wearing RM Williams in November 2023 (left) and Ariats in May 2024 (right). (ABC News: Matt Roberts)

These boots were made for walking, but they’re also talking

While fashion can be dismissed as trivial, what you wear says a lot about what you do, who you are and what you stand for.

Former US secretary of state Madeleine Albright famously used her brooch collection (now on display at the Museum of American Diplomacy) to convey foreign policy messages, while the late Queen Elizabeth II deployed soft diplomacy with sartorial flair.

Julie Bishop, as Australia’s foreign minister, would also speak in code through her fashion choices.

Julie Bishop always wore red when meeting with representatives from China, for example. She told the AFR the one time she wore gold, Wang Yi asked her why.(AAP: Mick Tsikas)

So what are politicians trying to say by wearing these billionaire-owned boots?

RM Williams boots, which sell for around $650, were founded in 1932 — also in Adelaide — and have long been considered the dress boot among farmers and pastoralists.

But they have also become ubiquitous in boardrooms across the country among those keen to project an image of wealth while simultaneously tapping into the “working man ethos”.

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This is a trend that started in the 1990s, according to Harris, when media mogul Kerry Stokes and “the original gangster” of business, News Limited CEO Ken Cowley, rescued the beleaguered brand.

When they started wearing the boot, their employees and associates followed.

“If you wanted to do business with them, if you were in meetings with them, or if you were of their ilk, then you started wearing RMs,” Harris says.

“And that, to me, is the DNA of why bankers, stockbrokers, financiers are wearing RM Williams boots. It dates back to the 1990s, not the much longer brand heritage of RM Williams making saddles and country accoutrements.”

The bootmaker’s icon status was cemented when Australian-born actor and “global boot ambassador” Hugh Jackman wore nothing but a pair of RMs in an ad campaign in 2020.

In buying the brand, Forrest’s company Tattarang ensured the boots would continue to be made locally, and expanded the South Australian workshop — which now employs 393 staff — before adding a new women’s line.

It also partnered with TAFE SA to offer traineeships in both leatherwork and industrial sewing “so that a new generation can learn the skills that RM Williams is keeping alive”.

“We care about our industry and craftspeople. Since Tattarang’s acquisition in 2020, RM Williams has invested $8 million in equipment and the floor space for the women’s line has expanded by 10,000 square metres,” a Tattarang spokesperson said in a statement.

Nicola and Andrew Forrest at the RM Williams factory in Salisbury.(ABC News: Stacey Lee)

Rossi’s headquarters are in Kilburn, about 15km down the road from RM Williams, and while some of its boots are manufactured at the workshop, other styles are made overseas.

S. Kidman and Co. did not respond to the ABC’s inquiries about the number of staff it employs or its future manufacturing plans.

Brands are bigger than Gina Rinehart and Twiggy Forrest

Despite any feelings Rinehart and Forrest may engender, or any controversy their views may attract, Harris reckons the brands are ultimately bigger than their billionaire owners.

And history shows that influential players can have some sway over the decisions of Australian brands — just ask federal MP Bob Katter, who briefly boycotted Akubra in 2015 when the company announced it had stopped using local rabbit skins for its iconic hats.

Bob Katter threatened to withdraw his lifelong support from Akubra in 2015.(AAP: Glenn Hunt)

If RM Williams or Rossi were to experience a dip in sales for any reason, Rinehart and Forrest could potentially rely on their own employees.

Staff working for their mining empires are offered discounts and encouraged to wear the boots owned by their respective bosses.

Ultimately, Harris says the images of Olympic medallists wearing their Rossi Boots on the Seine are a golden marketing opportunity for Rinehart.

“The publicity and promotion you generate by having some of the most successful, beautiful, high-profile people in Australia wearing that product would subvert any brand damage in my view,” he says.