Will you find the best running shoes at a big box store?
I asked my friend Jeremy the other day to help me make some videos of our experience shopping for running shoes at big box stores. We figured we would compare the level of knowledge, service and selection to that of a specialty running store, like Bandanna Running where we made our first video. We weren’t sure that we would find the best running shoes, but we figured we would at least get some footage.
Well, as it turns out NONE of them would let us make a video in their stores, even when we presented the exact list of questions to them. A couple tried to be helpful, but ultimately weren’t able to help us out. It always came down to the same one issue “corporate said no”.
This got me thinking, how could they possibly have the best running shoes when each individual store has no input into the selection of their shoes. For example, I remember Rich Harris talking about how he chose what he considered to be the best running shoes for trails here in Boise because he had run the trails here. Even it someone at the store level had run the trails here, would they be able to tell corporate what to buy?
Well, the stores we tried included Sports Authority, Big 5, Champs, Foot Locker and Finish Line. Here’s the video we made from our failure. We’re still trying to get an outlet store to let us make a video, so make sure you subscribe to our feed so you see it when it comes out. Meanwhile, it looks like your best bet for the best running shoes is a specialty running store.
Keep running.
September 13th, 2008 at 6:11 pm
[...] It’s all about trying to figure out if someone could really get the best running shoes from a big box sports retailer. We tried stores like Sports Authority, Big 5 and even mall type stores like Foot Locker and Finish Line. Not luck, but we still made a short video about our rejections. You can see it here: Best Running Shoes. [...]