2025 Women of the Year Awards: Lindsay Housman

Innovator: Lindsay Housman

Founder and CEO, Hettas

Most shoe companies have a “shrink it and pink it” mentality when it comes to female customers, says Lindsay Housman. “It’s really through marketing, communication and colour that footwear is differentiated for women,” says the Vancouver-based entrepreneur. As a lifelong recreational athlete (think playing tennis, taking HIIT classes and skiing), Housman noticed the toll that her running shoes took on her body, and she—along with husband Kyle Housman, CEO of Native Shoes—started taking steps toward creating shoes that were actually designed for the women wearing them.

“We wanted it to be research-backed—we didn’t just want to say we were making shoes for women and not make a difference,” says Housman, who is also managing director of Tadley Consulting. Using their own capital, she and Kyle launched Hettas and funded two public research projects through Simon Fraser University. “We’ve been basically bootstrapping, and getting really creative with sources of funding,” the founder explains. Grants, money raised from friends and family and pro-bono support kept the research running, and in 2022, Hettas scored a three-year grant through the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC).

Hettas’ findings—that women have higher arches, lower ankle bones, narrower heels and toes that are angled differently from men’s—were incorporated into the design of the three athletic shoes that the company now offers. The footwear is designed in Vancouver and manufactured in China (“that’s where the expertise to manufacture athletic footwear mostly resides,” says Housman). The founder notes that, while the product itself is innovative, so are the company’s marketing strategies: for example, there’s the Hettas community crew, a team of ambassadors that puts on run club demos and events in key target markets. A lot of support has come up organically, as well. (Vancouver’s Magnafire Media produced two videos featuring Hettas for free, and Victoria-based Feisty Media covered the company on a podcast and also brought Hettas shoes to the 2024 Paris Olympics.) Hettas is still small—besides Housman, there’s “one and a half” employees and a handful of contractors—but the trailblazing research and design has women racing to support it. Wearers report relief from Achilles injuries and joint pain, and Housman is focused on improving the shoes further. “I’m really proud that we produced a product that is making a difference in peoples’ lives,” she says. “Now, we can build that into the next wave of research.”

Discover our full list of 21 BCBusiness 2025 Women of the Year award winners here.