U.S. shoe workers once made some of the most modern shoes in the world, but most of those jobs are now in Asia. Now, the American sneaker factory could be coming back — with robots doing most of the work.

Reebok said Monday it plans to open a new high-tech laboratory in Rhode Island to make sneakers.

Bill McInnis is "head of future" for the sportswear company, based in Canton, Massachusetts. Since the U.S. is where new ideas come from, Reebok decided to make some of its most advanced shoes here instead of overseas, McInnis said.

A Return To The United States

In the 1970s, athletic shoe companies began making their shoes in factories in Asia where labor was cheaper. Now, the industry is beginning to come back in the United States for several reasons. It's getting more expensive to make shoes in Asia, because Chinese workers want to be paid more. Technological advances, like robotics, are helping to automate shoe production. Companies want to get sneakers made closer to where they're bought.

"Brands want to move closer to the U.S." to get their shoes into stores quicker, said Matt Powell. He is a sports industry expert with The NPD Group, which studies consumer trends. "Today when you make a shoe in Asia, it spends months on an ocean freighter."

Other Sneaker Giants Follow Suit

Germany's Adidas AG, which bought Reebok in 2005, is opening its first U.S. factory in Georgia next year. The factory, near Atlanta, will use mostly robots but employ at least 150 people.

This year, Under Armour Inc. opened a new design and manufacturing center in its home city of Baltimore. Athletic giant Nike Inc. has long been a symbol of the trend to outsource production to Asia. Even Nike has recently talked of making more of its products in North America.

Boston-based New Balance Athletic Shoe Inc. never left, and its sneakers are made in Massachusetts and Maine. Smaller companies have also stayed put, making New England the center of the country's shoe industry, Powell said.

McInnis said 100 percent of Reebok's products are made in Asian countries such as China, Vietnam and Taiwan. However, that could change if the company's Rhode Island experiment succeeds.

He said that it will make thousands of shoes, compared to the hundreds of thousands made in Asian plants. Among its most important goals is to accelerate the process of molding shoe soles, which can be slow and expensive.

Robots Will Do Most Of The Work

McInnis is a former NASA engineer. He said an industrial robot will draw ribbons of liquid that quickly harden into a sole, or the bottom of the shoe. The lab is scheduled to open early next year.

The equipment can all be programmed, so the company can quickly change from making one type of shoe to another, said Keith Lonergan. He is the president of AF Group, a plastics company that will be working with Reebok. "If you're selling them in New England, you could make them in New England," he said.

There is other technology that would make it cheaper to produce shoes in the U.S., said Matt Priest. He is president of the Footwear Distributors and Retailers of America. Other advances include 3-D printers, which some companies are now using to produce shoe parts.