George F. Johnson was a brilliant businessman and under his direction the Endicott Shoe Company became very prosperous very quickly. His early adoption of a new machine that could stitch "uppers" to "lowers" was the key to his success, meaning that for the first time in history unskilled labor could manufacture shoes. (Prior to this shoes were made to individual order by skilled cobblers. People who couldn't afford this bought used shoes, and had cobblers regularly replace the soles and heels as they wore out, until the uppers disintegrated.)