Moving In a New Direction : Retailing: After 16 years, John Loeschhorn closes the door of his running store next week.
The walls, once covered with every style and make of running shoe imaginable, are nearly bare now. Boxes of shoes are stacked high--and priced to move. Everything must go, even the posters that hang from the ceiling, pictures of running greats Bill Rodgers, Frank Shorter, Mary Slaney, Steve Scott, Rod Dixon, Allison Roe. . . .
After 16 years, Loeschhorn’s For Runners, the first name in Orange County running stores, has run its course. The Mission Viejo store will close for good Thursday, marking the end of an era in local running history. A tropical fish store will take its place.
John Loeschhorn, who owns the store with his wife Gail, says he’s closing shop because he’s tired of the business and because, at 46, he finally realized his career ambition when he became a police officer last year.
Besides, Loeschhorn says, he never intended to get into retailing in the first place.
A runner since 1958, Loeschhorn says he remembers the days when running shoes were thin and slipper-like, made of black canvas. A long run usually meant you’d end up with several blood blisters. A marathon meant you’d finish with shoes soaked in blood.
Stationed with his Air Force unit in North Carolina during the Vietnam War, Loeschhorn would drive to New York City every six months to buy running shoes. He couldn’t find them anywhere else.
In New York, he’d enter local races for a 25-cent entry fee, taking on about 30 others in a cross-town run. Unlike today’s highly organized road races, there were no guards to stop traffic and no pylons to close lanes. Runners were at the mercy of traffic signals.
When Loeschhorn came to California in 1975, running was still in its infancy. Tennis was king, and Loeschhorn began working for a Palo Alto man who re-soled tennis shoes. It was Loeschhorn’s job to drive around Southern California each day, collecting clients’ shoes and sending them up north.
“It got to the point where I was picking up 150 to 200 pairs a day, stuffing them in big canvas bags and dropping them off at Orange County airport,” Loeschhorn said. “I figured it was time to go into the re-soling business for myself.”
He opened a shop in Costa Mesa, but at the urging of an East Coast friend who owned a running shoe company called New Balance, Loeschhorn started selling running shoes, too. A year later, Runner’s World magazine ranked the New Balance 320 model as the No. 1 shoe on the market.
At that time, the only place in California to get New Balance shoes was Loeschhorn’s. He was swamped. Runners lined up at the cash register. Some days, he’d have seven employees on the floor, and it still wouldn’t be enough.
“People were coming from Timbuktu,” Loeschhorn said. “Overnight, I was in the retail business.”
Loeschhorn supplied customers with information on upcoming races and encouraged them to take a quick jog outside to see if the shoes they were trying on were right for them. Both are common practices at running stores today.
The store became something of a runner’s hangout. Fun-runs were scheduled on weeknights. Loeschhorn brought in guest speakers, such as Olympic middle-distance runner Steve Scott and Joe Henderson of Runner’s World, to give free clinics. He organized a running club, encouraging all levels.
“We put something in the sport,” he says. “We were an ear you could come to any time your training wasn’t going well, or to brag to after you ran a great time.”
Loeschhorn opened additional stores in Orange and Mission Viejo and had franchise stores in Simi Valley, Arcadia, Fountain Valley, Irvine and Cerritos. But other running stores were opening everywhere. His corner on the market dwindled, and with the increase of discount sporting-good warehouses and mail-order businesses, Loeschhorn decided it was time to get out.
Although Loeschhorn isn’t planning anything special for Thursday’s closing, he will get together with friends at 7:30 a.m. April 27 for a goodby run.
