I hate running stores

screw RW

shop at runningcenters.com

they give 15% off over whatever discounted price they have on their shoes and free shipping...no minimum purchase required!

[quote]newsflash wrote:

Specialty running stores trade on service. I can go to my local Fleet Feet and get anything I want; if they don't stock it then they'll special order it for me. Not gonna happen at Sports Barn. Same idea with Home Depot vs. local hardware store, if you're a contractor and know exactly what you need for the job then go with the lowest cost supplier but the average shmoe might want more sage input regarding his home project than the McEmployees at HD can provide. Plus local running stores (typically) are strong supporters of the local races. Chain (and online) stores hardly ever are.

Yes, a running shop will order anything you ask them to. But I've found that you'll get what you want much more quickly ordering over the Internet than special ordering from a shop. And if you end up not liking what you ordered from the shop you're stuck with it whereas you can always return things to the Internet palces.

And I have never found the "help" I get at a running shop particularly helpful. It usually comes down to an argument because they're trying to put me into some sort of technical shoe when all I want is a light, flimsy racer.

Semantics? If a company suspects that it's to their advantage to advertise their shoe as the lightest in the world, then, even to them, it isn't just "semantics". They are saying that to get people to buy their shoe. It's a lie!If it is just semantics and doesn't really matter, then why wouldn't they just say "One of the lightest . . ."? Answer: It matters. They want you to think it's THE lightest shoe.

The Man Who Loved Women wrote:

You're being a crank over semantics. It's the lightest shoe in the particular market, or at least close enough. If it's that big of a deal to you then wouldn't you compare weights anyway, independent of any marketing copy?

RUNNINGCENTERS wrote:

screw RW

shop at runningcenters.com

they give 15% off over whatever discounted price they have on their shoes and free shipping...no minimum purchase required!

You can ALWAYS find a 15% off coupon for Running Warehouse if you google it. Usually if you click on Team Discounts and enter "cp20" you'll get 15% off. Plus the free 2-day shipping.

HRE wrote:

Yes, a running shop will order anything you ask them to. But I've found that you'll get what you want much more quickly ordering over the Internet than special ordering from a shop. And if you end up not liking what you ordered from the shop you're stuck with it whereas you can always return things to the Internet palces.

And I have never found the "help" I get at a running shop particularly helpful. It usually comes down to an argument because they're trying to put me into some sort of technical shoe when all I want is a light, flimsy racer.

Why would anyone order something they don't like? This isn't rocket surgery, Einstein. And actually I can return about anything I want to a running shop. I don't know of any "Internet place" that has as liberal of a return policy as my local running shop. If I know what I want then what's to discuss? Talk to a manager or an owner, if you have enough confidence to do that. Seems to me you'd rather just not put yourself out there to form any relationships with merchants or go to so much 'trouble' to be invested in your local running community. You give up at the first hint of resistance or challenge. Symptomatic of our increasingly disconnected society, sadly. We'll be left with Walmart and Amazon to do any shopping because too many people are too timid or too lazy (or both) to be at all engaged.

Also just like I wouldn't wait until there is one dose left of a medication to get a doc to write a prescription refill, I wouldn't ever wait until my shoes are completely shot to get new ones. So I'm never in a rush to get shoes. A little forethought can go a long way in life, you might find.

I'm not fooled by advertising copy, ever. Are you really that stupid? What does it matter if it's the lightest running shoe in the world or just within one or two tenths of an ounce of the absolute lightest? Remove that rigid object from your sphincter.

Brent wrote:

Semantics? If a company suspects that it's to their advantage to advertise their shoe as the lightest in the world, then, even to them, it isn't just "semantics". They are saying that to get people to buy their shoe. It's a lie!

If it is just semantics and doesn't really matter, then why wouldn't they just say "One of the lightest . . ."? Answer: It matters. They want you to think it's THE lightest shoe.

The Man Who Loved Women wrote:

You're being a crank over semantics. It's the lightest shoe in the particular market, or at least close enough. If it's that big of a deal to you then wouldn't you compare weights anyway, independent of any marketing copy?

Shoe sizes, for example, are sometimes different from model to model or comapny to company. If I special order a shoe from the local running shop that I am intrigued by but have never worn before I'd better be accurate on the sizing. If not and it doesn't fit I'm stuck with it.

Our local shop does not have returns on special orders. If yours does that's a good thing. But if I get that shoe from Zappos I just put it in a box and ship it back.

Actually, the guy who owns the local shop is a friend and has been for many years. I prefer to buy from him even if it costs more but he rarely carries shoes that I want so I would nearly always need to get special orders and have a useless shoe if it doesn't fit correctly or simply feels worse than I thought it would. So I tend to buy other things from him and shoes from places where I can return them on the rare occasions that I need to do so.

In the retail world people will patronize businesses that sell what the customer wants to buy and not patronize businesses that don't carry what they want to buy. If a running shop wants "serious" runners to patronize them they need to carry what those serious runners want. Why would you buy stuff that you don't want from a merchant simply to keep that merchant in business? I'd mention that "it isn't rocket surgery, Einstein," myself but don't know what "rocket surgery" is or how difficult it is to perform.

You know what a figure of speech is, no? You might be slow, but even you should be able to parse it out or at least find someone who can help you.

In the retail world, "serious" runners aren't a lucrative segment. Ask your buddy what his men's running apparel figures look like, especially compared to those for women's running apparel. If you're so confident that you know what "serious" runners are willing to buy then why aren't you opening and operating a running store and making a mint?

After you've been running a few years it'll get easier to figure out how a shoe will fit without having to try it on first. I can order any shoe and be confident that it will fit well enough to let me run in it until it's worn out. I have yet to get a single pair of shoes I didn't like that way. It's incredibly simple for me at this point, I don't need to give it more than maybe five seconds of thought.

As for why I would buy stuff that I don't want, that's a pretty stupid question. I don't buy anything I don't want. I figure out how to get what I do want from a merchant that I value because they extend great service to me and they are an asset to a community in which I am invested. And I'm smart enough to get it for basically the same trouble, time, and price as anywhere else I could conceivably get it.

I buy from Holabird. They have the best prices. The people on the phone at any of these places are not usually very good. If you walk in to a running store each "shoe guy " has his or her own views on what works and what doesn't.

I'm frustrated with the shoe store and with how high maintenance my mother is.

She's not a runner, she's an older fitness walker. Despite that, I'd expect people like her to be a pretty large demographic for running shoe stores.

She went to the Fleet Feet three times, and each time they recommended a shoe that anyone should have been able to know would be inappropriate for a fitness walker. One of the times, the owner sold her stability flats. WTF?

I told her that if you go to the same store three times and strike out all three times, maybe it's time to start going to a different store. But she's easily impressed by "experts" and somehow she's gotten the idea that the Fleet Feet idiots are experts. When I was home for a visit, I finally convinced her to get some very cushioned shoes.

Of course, as soon as she needed new shoes, instead of getting the same kind that had worked for her last time, she let the dumbasses talk her into trying something different.

I'm getting tired of hand holding her through what should have been a simple process. She isn't making things easy, but the shoe store is making them worse.

Actually racing flats for walkers not a bad idea. The lower profile heels are better for people who walk at a little faster pace.

why not phidippides? they'll order pretty much anything you want

I agree. Stability flats actually sound like they would be ideal. You are coming off like a complete idiot.

Maybe your Mom is getting the type of shoe she wants and what they guy said makes sense ? maybe she is really happy with the shoes and her crazy daughter keeps coming over and giving her crap even though she loves wearing them ?

The last honest guy wrote:

Maybe your Mom is getting the type of shoe she wants and what they guy said makes sense ? maybe she is really happy with the shoes and her crazy daughter keeps coming over and giving her crap even though she loves wearing them ?

Then she should stop complaining to me about how much she hates the new shoes she comes home with. I wouldn't have gotten involved at all if she had been happy with what she'd gotten. I would have considered that obvious information, but I think you were just looking for a reason to criticize.

Reasons that I wouldn't have recommended stability flats for my mother are that she is lightweight, doesn't underpronate, has fairly high arches, has never worn flats before, and finds hard shoes too jarring on her back. That's not really privileged information that only a daughter could know. If I were fitting a stranger for shoes, I'd have found out the same things.

But more importantly, if I recommended the stability flats and then the customer came back because they weren't working for her, especially the firmness, I wouldn't put her back in almost the same thing.

I would have put her in Brooks Beast just for kicks.

Listen lady, you said yourself your mom is just the equivalent of a speed walker, she doesn't even run per se. Go to a Payless and pick up some sketchers. Jesus Christ, calm the F down, nobody needs $80 flats to walk a loop around the neighborhood.

running stores in the 80's/90's were great for providing customers with info they were unaware of.

now everyone can read the reviews, buy them cheaper online, and even get feedback from others online.

running stores are pretty useless for knowledgeable runners, they mainly target those who are new to the sport and have a good amount of disposable income to waste on their services because they call themselves "experts" and the stores look nice so these customers assume they are experts.

Your mom is an attention whore and I see now where you get it.