• People are realizing that the UGG shoes they've worn for decades may be different than they thought.
• That's because they purchased American-made UGGs — not shoes from Australian brand UGG Since 1974.
• The brands are separate companies with little in common besides their nearly identical boots.

You probably have a pair of UGG boots in your closet.

And just as likely, they're probably not the Australian-made shoes you think they are.

Leather, fur-lined boots have a history that goes back centuries, but the kind we wear today got their start in Australian surfing culture. Dubbed "uggs," an Australian slang term, the shoes were first regularly worn by surfers to keep their feet warm around the '50s.

Of course, when you hear the term in the US, you likely think of the trendy, brand-name footwear ideal for winter.

The UGG company's brown boots first became a sensation in the early 2000s, with everyone from suburban moms to celebrities like Beyoncé touting their Australian-made boots with authentic sheepskin fabrics and cloud-like linings.

And since then, various UGG styles have made a comeback thanks to Gen Z fashion fans.

However, many shoppers are now discovering that the shoes they've been wearing for decades aren't actually made in Australia. They're not created by the original ugg brand unless they were purchased from UGG Since 1974, an Australia-based company that handcrafts its products and has been around a few years longer than UGG.

UGG vs. UGG Since 1974

After sheepskin boots first became popular in the '50s and '60s, Australian couple Arthur Springthorpe and Faye Springthorpe took the shoes to another level in the '70s, according to a blog post from UGG Since 1974.

"Arthur and Faye drew on Arthur's years of experience as a wool classer in the shearing sheds of New South Wales to craft sheepskin moccasins and UGG boots, one pair at a time in our workshop, all those years ago," the brand's website says.

Though they didn't invent the term "ugg," the Springthorpes saw its potential as a business moniker and created a stable, family-run business in Australia.

And today, the brand is still going strong. You can buy its shoes at one store in Australia and around the world via its online shop.

But as UGG Since 1974 was rising to success in Australia, a competitor named UGG rose alongside them in the US.

Brian Smith, an Australian surfer and entrepreneur, founded UGG in 1978 after relocating to California.

In a 2014 interview with Forbes, Smith explained that he was looking to start a business while in school to be an accountant and found inspiration in sheepskin boots when he saw an advertisement for them in a friend's surfing magazine.

"Importing six pairs of boots as samples, I registered UGG as the trademark and settled down to be an instant millionaire," Smith told Forbes. "What I didn't know was that Americans didn't understand sheepskin like Aussies do."

Despite initial slow sales and business troubles, as Smith told the publication, the shoes eventually caught on with US surfers and professional athletes.

The US Olympic team, for example, wore UGG boots during the 1994 Winter Games in Lillehammer, Norway.

And later, celebrities grew to love the US-based UGG brand.

Oprah first featured UGG boots in her 2003 Favorite Things episode, and the shoes became a staple wardrobe piece for stars like Paris Hilton, Sarah Jessica Parker, and Kate Moss.

Deckers Brands, which owns popular footwear companies including Hoka, Teva, and Sanuk, then purchased the UGG brand in 1995.

Is there a difference? Shoppers say yes.

The fact that two major UGG brands exist is no secret.

Both companies have been around for decades, and the Australian version regularly states online that it has "no connection whatsoever, past or present, to the US company known as UGG."

However, many consumers have been entirely unaware of the similar yet different brands, which has led to a lot of confusion.

In December 2023, content creator Eliana Shiloh said in a TikTok video that she was "shook" to discover there was even a difference between UGG and UGG Since 1974 and that Deckers Brands mass-produces its UGG products with materials that aren't always from Australia. Deckers Brands did not respond to a request for comment.

In her video, which now has 2.3 million views, Shiloh said she thought the quality of the shoes she'd purchased from the brand had decreased over the years, which led her to question if she'd had UGG Since 1974 shoes as a child but bought American-made UGG boots as an adult.

As UGG Since 1974 explained in a TikTok video two days later, that's likely not the case.

"If you purchased your UGGs in the early 2000s in the USA or from the USA website, you've likely never owned a pair of our UGG Since 1974 boots," the video's narrator says. "Our UGG boots can only be purchased from one store in Australia and online through uggsince1974.com.au."

Shiloh told Business Insider that she came to the same conclusion after doing more research following her TikTok video. From now on, she plans to purchase shoes from UGG Since 1974 instead of UGG.

So, how did shoppers like Shiloh get so confused? Is there an UGG Mandela effect?

In a way, yes. UGG was once named UGG Australia, leading shoppers to believe they were purchasing shoes made in Australia with Australian materials.

The brand changed its name to UGG in 2016 when Australian ugg makers complained to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission that the American company's branding was misleading, The Sydney Morning Herald reported.

If you bought UGGs in the early 2000s, you were likely buying UGG Australia, which is now known simply as UGG.

As for how the brands differ, that all comes down to how (and where) the shoes are made.

UGG Since 1974 says on its website that it handcrafts its shoes, and the brand wrote in a since-deleted blog post that its competitor UGG mass-produces its products "in countries such as China, Vietnam, the Philippines and other parts of Asia."

"We strictly use Australian and New Zealand sheepskin, with all of our UGG boots being handcrafted from premium A-Grade Australian or New Zealand sheepskin," UGG Since 1974 said in its post.

Meanwhile, UGG details the materials used in the product descriptions of each of its items.

One of UGG's most classic designs, for example, utilizes sheepskin and "real fur from sheep or lamb," according to the UGG website. The site says that fur "may be sourced from Australia, Ireland, the United Kingdom, or the United States" and that it is "artificially dyed and treated." Other UGG products incorporate materials such as wool and lyocell, a fabric made from trees.

Representatives for UGG Since 1974 did not respond to a request for comment. When contacted by BI for this story, UGG declined to comment on the debate and feedback surrounding its products.

Sheepskin boots and trademark disputes

UGG, UGG Since 1974, and other ugg manufacturers don't necessarily co-exist peacefully.

In May 2021, a federal appeals court rejected a case from shoemaker Eddie Oygur, who sells ugg-style shoes through his brand Australian Leather, to remove UGG's American trademark.

Oygur told The New York Times in 2021 that he felt Australia should have sole ownership of the term.

"The trademark should never have been given in the first place to the US," he told the publication.

UGG Since 1974 said in its deleted blog post that this dispute — namely the the lack of rights for Australian brands — prevents them and other brands from widely selling ugg products in other countries.

The company also said it was then "working to preserve" the ugg term for Australian businesses to use in and outside the country.

However, as of January, UGG Since 1974 said on TikTok that it had been sued by Deckers and would be rebranding to Since 74 overseas. In Australia and New Zealand, the brand says it will remain as UGG Since 1974.

So maybe you own UGGs, UGG Since 1974 boots, or another dupe entirely.

But whatever you've got on your feet, the shoes likely have a deep, complicated history that's enough to make you say "ugh."

Minnesota's House Democrats boycotted the opening session of 2025 to prevent Republicans from using a temporary majority to elect a speaker.

Meta's recently announced cuts come after several restructuring efforts by the social media giant in recent years.

Portions of Pennsylvania and New York are under a lake-effect snow warning on Tuesday as heavy accumulations are possible.

Patricio 'Pitbull' Freire took to X to vent out the months-long frustrations he has had with PFL, which has now led to his release.

The SpaceX CEO is receiving major backlash after being accused of cheating.

Businesses in disaster-affected areas face filing deadlines as early as February 3.

• Jamie Foxx suffered a stroke in April 2023 while in production on his Netflix movie "Back in Action."
• Director Seth Gordon recounts how he continued making the movie while Foxx recovered.
• "Back in Action," starring Foxx and Cameron Diaz, is available Friday on Netflix.

Making a movie is never an easy or predictable process. But veteran writer-director Seth Gordon could only come up with one word to describe the challenges it took to make his Netflix movie "Back in Action": "special."

Gordon was prepping for a day of shooting in Atlanta on April 12, 2023, when he received a call no director ever wants: one of his stars wouldn't be reporting to work that day. But it got worse. The star, Jamie Foxx, had collapsed the day before and was in the hospital.

"We didn't know anything," Gordon told Business Insider via Zoom from Berlin. "No details. But we simply wanted to make sure he was OK as best we could. We put that priority first."

"Back in Action" was being billed as an action comedy about two CIA spies who have gone into hiding to start a family. With star power in Foxx and Cameron Diaz, who returned to acting for her first role in eight years, it had a lot of hype. Now, it would be known as the movie Foxx was making when he mysteriously collapsed.

It would take a months before the public would hear from Foxx again, as speculation ran rampant about what had afflicted the star. Revealing the cause of his mysterious illness would take longer. In his Netflix standup special "Jamie Foxx: What Had Happened Was...", released in December 2024, Foxx said he suffered a brain bleed that led to a stroke that rendered him unconscious for weeks.

During that time, Gordon and the producers of "Back in Action" scrambled to continue making the movie, holding out hope that Foxx would one day return to finish it.

Gordon resumed filming with Foxx body doubles, then rewrote some scenes

After the shock of Foxx's hospitalization wore off, Gordon had to figure out what to do with a movie that was already deep in production. A key action sequence was set to be shot the week Foxx fell ill.

Gordon said he wasn't panicked.

"From doing documentaries, I'm really used to having no idea what is actually going to happen," said Gordon, who, before making comedies like "Four Christmases" and "Horrible Bosses," made the beloved documentary "The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters."

"You do your best to guess and your best to plan and then you react to reality as it unfolds. So maybe my stomach is a little more used to that uncertainty than it should be."

With locations already locked and the rest of the cast and crew ready to go, Gordon powered through trying to shoot an exterior fight sequence sans Foxx.

"We shot part of it, what we could shoot without Jamie, which was limited," said Gordon. The shoot made headlines as pictures of Foxx's body double doing the scene alongside Diaz spread across the internet.

At that point, Gordon said he was at a loss for what would be the right way to proceed. Production was halted until he could get a better idea of Foxx's condition.

During the months-long downtime, Gordon said he began editing the movie and realized that some of the scenes they had yet to shoot were unnecessary.

"I basically reconceived a couple scenes," he said.

Now, all Gordon needed was for Foxx to get better.

Gordon never considered recasting Foxx, who finally returned to set cracking jokes

Despite knowing very little about Foxx's condition, Gordon said there was never a conversation to recast the Oscar winner.

"There's no movie without him, honestly," Gordon said. "It really became putting all our eggs in the basket of praying that he got better."

Finally, all anxieties were laid to rest when Foxx showed up to see a rough assembly of some scenes in the fall of 2023.

"He was 100%," Gordon said, recalling his shock when Foxx strolled into the editing bay like he hadn't been fighting for his life mere months earlier.

"In classic Jamie style he was smooth, was cracking jokes, holding court, he was hilarious, as usual," Gordon said of their meeting.

Gordon showed Foxx the thrilling plane crash sequence that opens the movie.

"He got really excited about what he saw," he said.

The star's return was a huge boost for production morale. Then word came that filming could resume in January 2024.

"We were doing backflips and just hoping everything would remain OK," Gordon said. "Jamie went through a pretty severe thing, and the last thing in the world we would want to have happen is the stress from shooting to cause something."

Gordon thinks Foxx's recovery is a miracle, and on-set spontaneity led to even better scenes

With the movie back on, Gordon shot the remaining scenes as well as some new ones showcasing the dynamic between spy parents Matt (Foxx) and Emily (Diaz) and their daughter Alice (McKenna Roberts), which Gordon devised during the pause in production.

In one scene, after Matt and Emily drop their kids off at school, Emily uses binoculars to spy on Alice and a boy. Matt snatches the binoculars so he can see. Then Gordon came up with an idea between takes.

"At the very last minute, I asked props if they had another pair of binoculars," he said. "I wrote it for one pair, but I thought it would be hilarious if she all of a sudden had a second pair."

They shot the next take on the fly, with Emily suddenly looking through a new pair of binoculars as Matt looks with the ones he originally took from her.

Gordon said the bit got a great reaction when they test-screened the movie. And it all came from the spontaneity created by the director's desire to be mindful of Foxx's health by keeping his workload light and not doing too many takes.

"Making movies is hard and those days can be long, so what I was trying to do was keep everything with him as brief as possible for him," Gordon said.

Looking back, Gordon is still amazed by Foxx's recovery.

"He's a bit of a miracle."

• Meta may plan for annual performance-based job cuts to boost employee performance standards.
• The strategy aims to increase non-regrettable attrition and remove the lowest performers.
• Affected employees will still receive bonuses and stock vesting despite the layoffs.

Meta's performance-based job cuts could become an annual occurrence, according to an internal FAQ document viewed by Business Insider.

The document, shared with employees by Hillary Champion, Meta's director of people development growth programs, directly addresses whether Meta's upcoming performance-related layoffs will happen every year.

"We are committed to a culture of high performance and are trying to raise the bar by increasing our annual non-regrettable attrition and moving faster to move our lowest performers out," Champion's memo says. "We may use future performance cycles to do that."

The development comes amid an already intense review process designed to cut about 5% of Meta's workforce deemed to be its lowest performers. These cuts are set to be finalized by February 10 for US-based employees, with some international notifications occurring later.

The FAQ also reassures employees that location will not influence their ratings or termination risk and confirms that anyone impacted by the performance reviews will still receive their February 15, 2025 vesting, any due dividends, and bonuses if any are eligible.

Do you work at Meta? Contact BI reporters from a nonwork email and device at [email protected] and [email protected].
You can also reach them via Signal at jyotimann.11 and +1408-905-9124.

Oversight began in 2013 after a DOJ investigation found widespread misconduct, racial bias, and corruption.

According to a new permit, the songstress has big plans for her Rhode Island home.

Pope Francis welcomed the New Year by thundering against the ongoing war in the Middle East.

Ted Cruz and Rick Scott reacted angrily to news that the president plans to lift the U.S. designation of Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism.

Two Texas Democrats supported a bill that would bar transgender women and girls from women's sports.

The Los Angeles Dodgers are urged to sign a two-time World Series champion in free agency.

Bill Gassen, CEO of America's largest rural health system, explained the company's bullish growth strategy to Newsweek.

Pete Hegseth, President-elect Trump's pick for secretary of Defense, dodged several questions during his often contentious Senate confirmation hearing Tuesday.

The big picture: Republicans' narrow Senate majority means they can only lose a handful of votes, and Democrats used the hearing to air Hegseth's allegations of sexual misconduct, financial mismanagement and excessive drinking and question how far he would go on Trump's behalf.

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• The former Fox News host and U.S. Army veteran, who some national security officials have cautioned may not have enough experience, traversed a tumultuous path to Tuesday's hearing.
• He's blamed a "smear campaign" for threatening to derail his nomination but has solidified support from key members of the GOP.

Here are some of the questions Hegseth dodged during his hearing:

Will he resign if he drinks?

Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) pressed Hegseth on accusations of excessive drinking, pointing to his vow not drink on the job if confirmed.

• He said he "absolutely" made that promise to Republican lawmakers.

Yes, but: Hegseth did not answer whether he would resign if he does drink, instead saying, "I've made this commitment on behalf of the men and women I'm serving because it's the most important deployment of my life."

Should domestic violence be disqualifying?

As part of a fiery exchange with Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), Hegseth would not say whether violence against a spouse should be disqualifying for a secretary of Defense.

He repeatedly told Kaine he "absolutely" had never committed physical violence against any of his three wives.

• He called Kaine's question "a hypothetical."

Would he use the military against Americans?

Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) pressed Hegseth on whether he'd support using the U.S. military against American citizens — and Hegseth's answer seemed inconclusive.

• "If Donald Trump asked you to use the 82nd Airborne in law enforcement roles in Washington, D.C., would you ... convince him otherwise?" she asked.
• "I'm not going to get ahead of conversations I would have with the president. However, there are laws and processes inside our Constitution that would be followed," Hegseth replied.

Zoom out: As part of Hirono's questioning, Hegseth did not directly answer whether he'd approve of shooting protesters in the legs, in reference to the suggestion former defense secretary Mark Esper said Trump gave him in 2020.

• "Senator, I was in the Washington, D.C., National Guard unit that was in Lafayette Square during those events," Hegseth replied, "holding a riot shield on behalf of my country."

Would he seize Greenland by force?

Hegseth sidestepped another inquiry from Hirono, who asked whether he would comply with an order to claim Greenland or the Panama Canal by force, as Trump has threatened.

What he's saying: Hegseth applauded Trump for "never strategically tipping his hand" in response to Hirono's question, adding he would not provide details in "this public forum."

• "That sounds to me like that you would contemplate carrying out such an order to basically invade Greenland and take over the Panama Canal," Hirono replied.

Should the U.S. follow the Geneva Conventions?

Hegseth did not appear to commit to upholding the laws of combat governed by the Geneva Conventions during questioning from Sen. Angus King (I-Maine).

What he's saying: "We have laws on the books from the Geneva Conventions into the Uniform Code of Military Justice, and then underneath that, you have layers in which standard or temporary rules of engagement are put into place," Hegseth said. "We fight enemies ... that play by no rules."

• Pressed by King, he said, "We don't need burdensome rules of engagement that make it impossible for us to win these wars."

Zoom in: Asked if the conventions' ban on torturing prisoners still applies, Hegseth called the conventions "incredibly important" but said how wars are fought has evolved.

• "Your position is torture is OK, is that correct?" King asked.
• Hegseth contended that was not what he said, adding, "I've never been party to torture."
• Later, when pressed on past comments he made seemingly endorsing waterboarding, Hegseth responded, "The law of the land is that waterboarding is not legal."

Go deeper: Scoop: Hegseth opening statement pledges Pentagon "warrior ethos"

President-elect Trump's administration will be intently focused on making the U.S. border more secure and deporting people who are in the country illegally, but may prove more open to legal immigration of highly skilled workers.

• Done right, that would be an economic boon, a new paper argues.

Why it matters: The report, out Tuesday morning from the centrist Economic Innovation Group, finds that when some of the world's most talented and entrepreneurial people are allowed into the United States, the results are faster growth, higher wages for native-born citizens, and lower fiscal deficits.

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• It is America's "not-so-secret weapon," they write, while identifying numerous weaknesses in current policy that prevent those benefits from fully accruing.

State of play: MAGA world has been roiled in recent weeks by a clash between Trump allies (led by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy) who want more legal immigration of highly skilled workers and the nativist right (including Steve Bannon and Laura Loomer) who want less.

• Trump sided with the pro-skilled immigration crowd last month.
• While that conversation specifically focused on the H-1B visas, it implies some broader openness to rethinking how America might open its doors to the world's best and brightest, as Musk and Ramaswamy seek.

By the numbers: The authors calculate that under the current H-1B program, the typical skilled immigrant pays more than $32,000 per year in federal taxes, while consuming only about $3,500 worth of government services.

Zoom in: "Our high-skilled immigration system should be designed first and foremost to advance the national interest of the United States and the interests of its communities and workers," write Adam Ozimek, Connor O'Brien and John Lettieri.

• "Designed well, immigration policy can make our workers more productive, make American industry more globally competitive, spark new growth in left-behind parts of the country, and improve living standards nationwide," they add.
• They argue that the system should be based on bringing in workers with the highest earnings, as opposed to the lottery system used in the H-1B program or offering visas based on education.
• This, they argue, would ensure it's the immigrants with unique skills and the greatest ability to add to economy-wide productivity who are allowed in — not just undercutting wages of native-born workers.
• The authors also advise abandoning quotas by country, further pushing toward a system based on merit that brings in tippy-top talent.

What they're saying: "The fact that the president-elect has reaffirmed his support for high-skilled immigration presents a very interesting moment where what has been an afterthought in our broader immigration has a chance to become a centerpiece, as we think it should be," Lettieri, the president of EIG, tells Axios.

• "There's enormous pressure to turn the tide on the fiscal outlook of the country and to find ways to boost the economy that don't carry a huge price tag," he adds. "There are very few levers to pull that meet those criteria."

• Long-distance train travel can be the journey of a lifetime — so long as you avoid common mistakes.
• After spending 140 hours traveling nearly 4,000 miles by overnight trains, I've had some regrets.
• I've forgotten to check for WiFi access, slept in the wrong bunk, and overlooked lounge access.

I've spent 140 hours traveling nearly 4,000 miles on overnight trains in the US and Europe.

It all started in October 2021, when I took two 30-hour Amtrak rides between Miami and NYC.

Since then, I've spent a total of 65 hours traveling on overnight European trains between Berlin, Vienna, Venice, and Paris.

And most recently, in January, I spent 15 hours on another Amtrak sleeper train from Denver to Salt Lake City.

Looking back, I could have been more comfortable and gotten more out of all these rides if I avoided a few big mistakes.

• Some Starbucks customers are using the chain's mobile app to try to get faster drive-thru service.
• But Starbucks store employees say it just makes their job more difficult.
• The habit also points to improvements that CEO Brian Niccol could make as he attempts a turnaround.

Starbucks baristas have a request for customers: Stop pulling into the drive-thru, then ordering coffee through the app and asking for it a minute later.

Starbucks provides customers who order through the app an estimated time when their order will be ready. They can also designate whether they want to pick up their order through the drive-thru or in-store while ordering, though Starbucks employees told Business Insider that many customers don't appear to pay attention to those options.

Still, some Starbucks customers appear to think that hacking the system by placing their order through the app when they're about to pull into the drive-thru — or when they're already waiting in line — will get them their Venti pistachio lattes faster and mean less waiting.

Some employees say it has the opposite effect, snaring their drink production. The employees also said the disruptive "hack" shows areas where the coffee giant could improve its order prioritization and preparation process.

Business Insider spoke to three Starbucks employees about the issue. They asked not to be identified in this article, citing potential retaliation at work, but BI verified their employment at Starbucks.

Starbucks stores often have two separate production lines: One for drive-thru orders and another that handles orders placed in-store, through the app, and through third-party delivery apps like Uber Eats. When someone places an order, it's routed to one of these bars and generates a sticker that employees can attach to the side of a cup or other packaging.

"When people place their mobile order while they're already in line or they place their mobile order and show up a minute later, their mobile order might be behind 15 other people," one barista in the South told BI.

As a result, when the customer drives up to collect their coffee, "sometimes we haven't even seen the item that needs to be made," a barista in Florida told BI.

That means Starbucks workers, whom the company calls "partners," have to manually move that order to the front of the production line, employees say.

Preparing those orders on the spot can be especially hard if they contain multiple drinks. "It is our pet peeve, for sure," the barista said.

Starbucks CEO Brian Niccol, who joined the company in September, has said that he wants baristas to get customers their orders in four minutes or less.

He said he wants to distinguish between the company's quick service, provided for customers using the chain's mobile app in the drive-thru, and its slower, more personalized service that some walk-in customers might prefer.

Niccol has also emphasized the importance of removing obstacles for partners doing their jobs in-store. "Our green-apron partners want to provide exceptional service to our customers," Niccol said in an October message to shareholders, adding that Starbucks' leaders "need to remove those things that might stop them from doing that."

While it's still early, some Starbucks employees have told BI that some changes Niccol has overseen have already made their lives easier. Starbucks said late last year that it would cut back on promotions, such as multi-drink deals, offered to its rewards customers through its mobile app. Some baristas have told BI that the move has made filling mobile orders less hectic.

The Florida partner previously said that Starbucks' decision to blend some drinks instead of shake them by hand has cut production time and allowed workers at his store to fill orders faster.

When it comes to mobile ordering, "We're working to improve sequencing with a new algorithm that enables on-time mobile order handoffs and supports our four-minute throughput with quality being our goal," a Starbucks spokesperson said. "And over the coming months, we plan to take steps to better separate mobile order pickup from the café experience."

Starbucks is expected to tell employees more about its plans in a three-hour meeting that will close store dining rooms next week.

Some partners have suggestions about what might improve the situation.

The barista in the South said that Starbucks could have a separate drive-thru lane just for picking up mobile orders — something Chipotle did under Niccol's leadership with its Chipotlanes.

Such a change could help shorten drive-thru wait times as well as improve the experience for customers who want to enjoy their order in-store, the barista said.

"When you place an order at the register, your order goes in behind all of the mobile orders that I have, so I'm going to be making drinks for people that are still driving to the store while you're already in the store waiting," the barista said.

"That doesn't create a good experience for the customer," the barista added.

Do you work at Starbucks and have a story idea to share? Reach out to this reporter at [email protected].