Abstract: An automatic system for forming custom-made shoe inserts for a person's feet from a pair of blanks is provided with a foot impression mechanism for simultaneously forming an impression of the contour of the undersurface of each of the person's feet and for releasably retaining each impression formed. The system is also provided with a blank holding assembly for holding the blanks in lateral alignment with the impressions, a blank shaping mechanism for successively sensing each impression and for concomitantly successively cutting material away from each blank in conformance with the corresponding sensed impression, and a drive mechanism for automatically driving the blank shaping mechanism both laterally and to-and-fro over the impressions and the blanks in response to a single drive motor so as to automatically form the custom-made shoe inserts from the blanks in conformance with the impressions.