Fleet Feet West Chester

Fleet Feet West Chester Project Spotlight

We're proud to share with you some photos and details of a recent store design we've completed in West Chester, Ohio owned by Frank and Stacey DeJulius.

With input from them on what the priorities were in their new store, we took a different approach on merchandising some of their key product categories, for example:

We focused and curated the apparel section which is heavy on mannequins and lighter than usual on apparel inventory. Many apparel pieces are highlighted on a mannequin to make it easier to shop and get inspired by pre-selected outfits that their customers can grab quickly and without too much effort.

We chose a light color palette for the store in general so we could really make a few sections stand out such as the light box cash wrap sign which is a bold statement piece. Another highlighted section is the faux brick wall on the back of the store, as a backdrop for the running shoes sections.

A few thoughts from Frank on the new store...
This store is different from our others because it has a clear design focus and theme. It’s also much smaller, more modern.

With a smaller square footage, (about 1150sq. ft.) we had to make every inch count and really pare down our selection to our best sellers in terms of apparel, accessories and footwear. We also had to make the entire store very compelling and interesting to offset the small size.

I began working for Fleet Feet Cleveland in 2004 and outside of a 1 year stint working for Zoot Sports in California I have been with Fleet Feet ever since, in multiple locations, training before eventually buying Fleet Feet Cincinnati in 2012 when it was just one store. I'm a competitive endurance athlete and love the culture of Fleet Feet along with the fact that it is also a very prosperous business.

Frank & Stacey really had their hands full with all of the work that comes with a new baby, who was born in the middle of the store opening process (big congrats to Frank & Stacey!) In addition to the baby, they had to deal with a horrible flood of the store days before they were to open. They've handled both like champs and the store is open and doing great!

One unique design feature used in the store are these wall mounted wood panels that highlight various shoes and have local trails printed on the face. They turned out really sharp! In addition to the local topo map prints on the panels, we're displaying the trail shoes with this custom shoe display that shows the customer the sole of the shoe as well as the upper.

Another design feature we implemented was these loose sketchy renderings of running shoes printed on a vinyl material and applied around the front window and on front wall of the store. This graphic is a unique combination of modern footwear design work blended with old school original hand drawings by industry veteran, Lou Patterson. These designs are from when he was drawing footwear and apparel illustrations for running publications in the seventies. We dug up some of his old gems to create this one of a kind artwork.