How much does a running store employee make

How many high schools are in your city? The runners on those teams need shoes. Running stores are kept open because of the high school and middles schools who have track and cross country teams. They all need shoes.

Also, your average runner builds a relationship with the running store through the races that that running store organizes.

Alan

Uh, tough ninny pooh-poohs. All's fair in love & retail. My dollar can go towards buying the home of an investor at Roadrunner Sports just as easily as it can go towards buying you your next Hummer. The cheapest price wins, and if you don't like it, oops. (Question, Mr. Running Store Owner---do you & YOUR family do your food shopping at the expensive local mom & pop store, or do you buy your toilet paper, milk, breads, etc. at a box store like Costco? yeah, that's what I thought. Carry on.)

________________________________

"And if your intent is to come in and go through an entire gate analysis and shoe fitting with the intent of writing the name down and going to find the shoe a few bucks cheaper online then what you are doing is far worse then me trying to with hold the name of the shoe from you so you dont cheat us. Have respect for your local running specialty stores."

Typical running store "the customer is always wrong" attitude that drove me to order on line in the first place.

We are fortunate to have Hansons in our area and they are great to shop with. They make running fun and that is well worth the price of my running equipment.

I'm sorry but you're giving your self too much credit for this "gait analysis". Unless you are doing this in a lcinic or at a University I highly doubt you are doing anything much different then any other running store...watching the person walk, looking at the feet and putting them in shoes until they like a pair. The fact that you don't let your customers know the name of the shoe is stupid. Why can't you just be comfortable in your customer service to ensure repeat business. People aren't as low down as you seem to make them out to be.

I never said the customer is always wrong. When they try to rip us off then i have some resentment toward them but hopefully people come to running stores to seek their knowledge and experiance and allow us to help them and fit them properly. you can buy shoes online all day long if you want but if you come to a running specialty store dont have us go through the whole process with you just to have you write down the shoe name and go buy it online, its just not right.

I too have shopped at zappos... great selection. They do 8 x what road runner does in sales and guess what? They sell for $3-5 dollars over MSRP. I will bet more expensive than any running store in the country. Why? Speedy shipping free. Which translates to service. That is what specialty running shops offer..service. If you don't need the service save your self the 5 bucks twice a year and buy you self a dinner at subway or a ticket to the movie. And know you savvy shopper that you got one over on everyone by buying your running shoes online.

$10 per hour

Apparel Buying/Regular working

40% Discount on everything, taken out of salary. Sweet deal for a college girl.

what to do... wrote:

$10 per hour

Apparel Buying/Regular working

40% Discount on everything, taken out of salary. Sweet deal for a college girl.

Yes, getting back to the OP's original question, what you say describes the appeal of working in a running store. Certainly the hourly wage isn't that great (but is better than a lot of entry level retail sales jobs); however, as an owner, I tried to give the employees as many perks as possible. Oftentimes, the perks did not cost much, but could be squeezed out of the shoe and apparel companies with free product, or at least great employee-purchase opportunities. A sharp rep will see the merit in giving a floor salesperson some freebie shoes or apparel. Not only does that person wear the product in the store, but the employee develops a liking for that brand. Also, if we had a fantastic sales month, I would give out bonuses of $25-$50 at the end of the month as a reward to the individuals who made it happen! Interestingly, I once did an informal survey of what employees valued the most. Wasn't money (hourly wage), but instead, they wanted to be valued by management and owner. Boy, was that an eye-opener. At one time we had working on the sales floor, two former attornies, podiatric intern, chiropractic intern, and half a dozen grad students. Also, the few high school kids we had working were all in the top 10% of their class. My general manager and myself once made the observation that we were the least-educated individuals on the payroll; we just had regular old BS degrees from large universities. Employees are EVERYTHING in a running store!