San Diego Leather was founded officially in 1974. It is a family owned and managed business. The store has been moving around San Diego for all those years; the first store opened in Chula Vista, in Bay Boulevard as the San Diego Leather Jacket Factory the official name back then. The Store had many of the family members working for the comapany at one point, through out the years most of them moved on to other paths, however, family still remains and works in San Diego Leather.

In 2003 we moved to our new location in National City to make San Diego Leather a better bigger store for you to visit and so leather shoppers like you have a wonderful shopping experience. Some, things changed, we now how a bigger store for you to shop on and the name changed a little for corporate reasons to San Diego Leather Inc. but we still are known with the original name San Diego Leather Jacket Factory and we are also know by our Internet domain name Leather.com

The store is still the best leather apparel store in the County, nobody can beat our prices and nobody does what we do in the leather apprel field such as alterations and repairs on you leather items; nobody makes and customizes leather jacket like we do, nobody offers what we do, like a fast walk-in on the fly alteration service or sewing emblems on you jackets while you wait and hundreds of accessories for all kinds of leather apparel users.

We have introduce new services recently such as professional leather cleaning service that we send out to a cleaning professional company that we trust with your leather. Another recent service that was introduced is Embroidery, that we are still in new territory, but we are breaking ground in a speedy manner thanks to customers that have made project requests and popular demand.

We continue to grow each year and we get involved in the latest ways to get in contact with our customers such as the social media, video archiving and other sources of where you can find us to make a purchase, such as Ebay and Amazon. While we do find new ways to get our customers new services and new ways to keep up with popular demand, San Diego Leather keeps its traditions and reputation according to the family values it was founded on and it will keep them always.

Q. Do you make leather jackets in house?
A. Yes we make many of the models in our website here in National Ciity in our Building, normally the will be marked as USA Made or Made in the USA.

Q. Can you make custom orders?
A. Yes, we are able to customize orders or make original designs if its to the reach of our production team.

Q. Can people mail in items for repair?
A.Yes, but make sure you talk to our staff first for assessment.

Q. Do you repair leather jackets?
A. Yes, we can repair most leather apparel. When the repair is complex, we need to see the item so we can give you proper assesment in price and time.

Q. Describe the most common types of jobs you do for your clients.
A. In the store its mostly common alterations, such as shortening sleeves, hemming pants, slimming jackets or the most popular one for walk ins sew embroidered patches on vests or jackets. Over the mail re-dying jackets is the most popular request.

Q. Describe three recent jobs you've completed.
A. We recently finished some jackets for the USS Midway museum, another order was completed for a Commercial Airline named National Air Cargo and we also just turned in a custom order for 3 sets of leather pants in different colors for one customer that was very happy with his merchandise, we expect him to come back soon.

Q. What advice do you have for a customer looking to hire a provider like you?
A. If you are not coming to shop in the showroom in person, only online or over the phone, please make sure you always consult with us or any leather apparel retailer over the phone.

Q. If you were a customer, what do you wish you knew about your trade? Any inside secrets to share?
A. Are we able to make copies of other leather jackets? Yes we are, however to a limit, some specialty accessories are not managed or used by our staff such as braiding, special studs, hard case leather to name some Secrets? Mmm, we were on TV on the Discovery Channel once on Factory Made

Q. What questions should a consumer ask to hire the right service professional?
A. If the service is possible to provide, the price that it will cost, the price for shipping (back and forth) and the return and guarantee policies.

Q. What important information should buyers have thought through before seeking you out?
A. We deal with apparel leather, that means no shoes, no hard case leather and although we sell saddle bags we do not repair those either.

Q. Why does your work stand out from others who do what you do?
A. Because we have been doing it for a long time and our staff is the most experienced in leather anywhere, if they can't do it, nobody can.

Q. What do you like most about your job?
A. The people we meet. We get to meet people from all kinds of fields of professions making requests be that of military, motorcycle clubs, pilots, police, Hollywood companies and even the actor's themselves from time to time.

Q. Do you have a favorite story from your work?
A. We had our most complex and unique custom order in the trench coat of a video game character from the video game Red Steel and even after the price was quoted was very high, the customer chose to go ahead with this project and by so, testing the limits of our production team skills. It is a great design, the complexity of the features made the result a great and unique trench coat that was also the most expensive to make.

Q. What do you wish customers knew about you or your profession?
A. That there is still some of us still doing this type of business in the USA.

Q. How did you decide to get in your line of work?
A. This is a Family owned business so it started with Family.

Q. Tell us about a recent job you did that you are particularly proud of.
A. A company named Monsters and Makeup came to us with an unusual request for something we ended up calling Gorilla Leather Gloves and Gorilla Leather Vests. These items were costume props that were used in the different TV and big screen movie series of the Planet of the Apes continuing sequels that came out on the 80s and up to the newest installments, for which we just made the most recent batch of props a couple of months ago for the most recent movie installment for which we are currently making props.

Q. Do you do any sort of continuing education to stay up on the latest developments in your field?
A. We explore through our customers that bring new requests to our table and we evolve and self educate ourselves so that those requests turn into new services and merchandise for future customers.

Q. What are the latest developments in your field? Are there any exciting things coming in the next few years or decade that will change your line of business?
A. We are introducing new items and licensed products to our business based on people's requests that will further amplify our wide range of customers in leather apparel.

Q. Describe your most recent project, what it involved, how much it cost, and how long it took.
A. We recently made some deerskin leather jackets and did some embroidery on them for a company that does custom work on cars for collectors. We made 2 custom order jackets that took about 2 weeks to make and they cost about $450.00 per jacket.

Q. If you have a complicated pricing system for your service, please give all the details here.
A. Prices will vary on alterations, repairs and custom orders depending on the complexity and time required to do the work. If the request appears to be not as simple as you think and you are not able to come in the store, its better that you consult with us over the phone or email so we can give you a proper assessment and price.

Q. If you were advising someone who wanted to get into your profession, what would you suggest?
A. Make sure that you hire experienced staff that know how to work with leather, as it is different than working with normal apparel.

Q. What is your greatest strength?
A. That we are open to new things and suggestions and, although we cant comply with everything, we will listen and at least try, if we are unable to follow through we will let you know or recommend if we have knowledge of somebody else that can do it.

Q. What are you currently working on improving?
A. We are always working on improving everything we do, that is a process that does not stop.

Q. Do you have Military Discount?
A. Yes on all merchandise (only on merchandise) its 5% off for store walk-ins with official identification (V.A. Card is Good).

Q. Write your own question and answer it.
A. Can you repair purses and accessories? No we are unable to repair purses and small accessories because they are too small for our machines to be worked on.

Q. Can you repair shoes?
A. No, we do not have the proper tools and skills to work on foot wear, however if you do call us we may be able to recommend a local business that may be able to the repair for you.