Chris Farley, the owner of Pacers Running, turned his passion for running into an athletic shoe retailer with five Washington, DC-area brick-and-mortar shops and an online business with national reach. He frequently gives back to the Washington, D.C., community, hosting 10Ks and marathons.
“It’s become more than just a running store. We feel like we’ve become a running brand. We always were passionate about going where the runner is,” said Farley.
10 years ago, when Farley opened his store in Amazon, it accounted for 2% of his overall sales. It was a small footprint, but Farley said he could see the potential. And then, “everything changed during the pandemic. Now the digital space, the e-commerce space has grown way beyond what I would’ve ever imagined,” he said.
Today, Farley has built a successful omnichannel strategy between brick-and-mortar retail and selling shoes online. Being in running communities with physical stores is part of Pacers Running plan, but it’s expensive, said Farley. “These are expensive places to do business from the brick and mortar side, and we want to be there because that’s where the runners are, and we want to be in these running communities,” he said. “Amazon helps us be able to afford these high rents.”
Amazon is able to offer Pacers Running customers upwards of 20 times the amount of inventory of any one of Farley’s stores. And, by using Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) to store, pack, and deliver shoes on his behalf, “we don’t need to be the experts in warehousing and third party logistics,” he said.
“Anything that we do on Amazon, our growth and profitability is reinvested in this D.C. running community,” said Farley. “With Amazon, we can do what we’re good at, which is helping as many people as possible through running.”