Leather sector can add more than 5000% value to cattle hides
A new article in World Leather reveals that the value tanners and leathergoods manufacturers can add to raw cattle hides now far exceeds the 2000% figure that the magazine reported five years ago.
With hide prices remaining cheap and the price of high-end leathergoods increasing substantially in the last five years, the percentage figure that the value that the leather sector can add to cattle hides is now almost 5500%.
For an article in World Leather August-September 2025, the magazine worked with colleagues at Alliance France Cuir to calculate the investment that French tanners made in bovine hides at €232.7 million last year. From this, the tanners produced finished leather worth €424 million, a value-add of 82%.
But the real economic multiplier came when France’s 387 leathergoods manufacturing companies used the leather to make handbags and other finished products. Their work produced a staggering €13 billion in exports in 2024. Based on the value of the raw hides, this represents a value-add of 5486%.
According to World Leather, these findings underscore the economic imperative for making sure hides stay in the circular economy rather than go to waste. In the right hands, they are an extremely valuable asset.
The full article appears on page 42 of the magazine and also in the Long Read section of the September 2 edition of the Leatherbiz Market Intelligence newsletter.
Image: Longchamp, Paris.
