Jan. 19, 2023
After 35 years in Sioux Falls, Stride Rite plans to shut.
“I’m so emotionally devastated,” stated Tami Lien, the longtime proprietor of the licensed companion retailer. “As quickly as folks stroll within the door, tears are flowing like no one’s enterprise.”
Lien initially managed the shop at The Empire Mall, then turned the native proprietor 23 years in the past when she moved it to the River Plaza retail middle at 2425 S. Shirley Ave.
Online retail has minimize considerably into her gross sales, she stated. While Stride Rite affords on-line procuring, it’s separate from the native shops.
E-commerce “is the rationale you simply can’t compete,” she stated. “COVID completely took me out, however then, in fact, this final 12 months was absolutely the killer since you couldn’t get product. How do you’ve gotten a shoe retailer with no footwear?”
Shoe shipments have been delayed as much as 10 months, Lien stated.
Since asserting the choice to shut, she has been so busy she stated she hopes the stock lasts till the tip of her lease March 31.
“I’m sitting OK however hoping it would maintain me out till the tip of March,” she stated.
There are solely about six or seven equally licensed Stride Rite retailers left nationwide, she stated.
Many areas are in different retailers, together with Dillard’s and Scheels.
“I don’t know of anyone that might do what I’ve completed — work and work and never take a paycheck,” Lien stated, including she has “poured my coronary heart and soul into the enterprise.”
Store hours are 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and 10 a.m. to five p.m. Thursday and Saturday.