Store hits 60 years with a 360-degree view

Saxon Shoes owner Gary Weiner in his Short Pump office. (Photos by Michael Thompson)

Richmond’s retail scene has many threads but few that can be followed 60 years back.

Saxon Shoes is one of those threads.

In 1953, Gloria and Jack Weiner opened Saxon Shoes at 410 E. Main St., selling orthopedic children’s shoes for $8 a pair. By the 1960s, the store had moved to the Libbie and Patterson area, and Gary Weiner, born four years after Saxon launched, was helping his parents stock the shelves. Gary Weiner assumed control of the company in the 1980s, and the store moved in 1989 to the Regency Square area, where a Fresh Market stands now.

In 2005, the store moved into 26,000 square feet in Short Pump, where today it sells shoes that range from $60 to $300, in addition to accessories and hand bags.

Saxon opened a second location in Fredericksburg in 2009, and the two spots employ a total of about 130 people.

BizSense sat down with Weiner, 56, to hear how the independent shoe store stays current, how the economy has affected retail fashion and whether you really can tell a person by the kind of shoes he wears.

Below is an edited transcript.

Richmond BizSense: How has Saxon stayed in business for 60 years? Do you have to keep changing with the times, or is there something timeless about Saxon that people like?

The 26,000-square-foot flagship.

Gary Weiner: Both. There are some timeless things about Saxon’s that people love, like our warm feel, like our community involvement, which is untouchable for any other shoe store in the area. Whatever it is, we want to try to help people wherever we can, and that’s different from many businesses. That’s number one, and the other thing is we’re always re-creating our business to be more contemporary.

We’re interested in everything, but right now our focus is to be the category killer of branded footwear for men, women and children.

RBS: How do you spot a trend?

GW: I go to trade shows and I listen to people. I go to conferences and I listen to people. I call other retailers who are buddies of mine and we talk. I read trade publications. If I’m going out of town, I read everything I can while I’m out of town at a local city. I get my information everywhere I can, any way I can, from anybody I can. From 8-year-olds to 80-year-olds, it just doesn’t matter.

RBS: Would you say the Internet necessitated the most dramatic re-creation for Saxon?

GW: No, because I’m an Internet guy. I started and sold an Internet business that is now part of Zappos. 6PM.com is Zappos’s discount site. I created 6PM. I created the business called shoedini.com in 1999, the magical way to buy shoes online. I grew it pretty nicely from ’99 to 2004, sold it to a company called eBags out in Colorado. They changed the name after a year to 6PM and then sold 6PM to Zappos. So, Zappos’s discount site was created at my kitchen table.

You’ll see Saxon with a bigger Internet presence again now that my non-compete clause [from the sale of shoedini] has expired.

RBS: Where does the name, Saxon, come from?

GW: My mother was born in Casablanca, Morocco, and in the ’40s, when they migrated through Europe to New York, they were in London and a few other European cities for a while. In London, there is a department store called Saxone, which was famous for service. When they decided to open a store, my mother and father, she kind of picked that name out and said, “That’d be a good idea.”

RBS: Do you believe in the adage that you can tell a man by his shoes?

GW: Not all the time, but I do believe that shoes can make the man. I’m a firm believer that there’s nothing wrong with looking good. I’ve been told that women in particular really like a nice pair of shoes on a guy, so shoes do make the man.

Shoes at Saxon range from $60 to $300.

RBS: Do you think our culture has become more fashion forward?

GW: It’s all cyclical. We go from fashion forward to grunge to conservative-traditional. When the economy was bad these past few years, fashion really took a hit. Better footwear took a hit. That’s starting to come back, but is it new? No, it’s really more cyclical.

RBS: So when the economy is good people want to dress well?

GW: People can afford more things. People feel better about more things. The past few years, people haven’t felt good because of what’s going on with the economy and the government, and all that hopefully is getting better.

RBS: How do you like to spend your free time when you have some?

GW: I make sure I have free time. I’m a firm believer that you should learn something every day, work every day and have some fun every day. I’m a firm believer in trying to get all three of those things in.

I play competitive basketball in an over-50 league in Short Pump. I play a little bit of competitive tennis. I throw a wicked Frisbee, and I can do quite a few 360s on a kneeboard behind a boat.

RBS: Nice.

GW: Yeah, it is. I’m 56, so it is nice. My goal is 60. At 60, I want to be doing 360s behind the boat.

RBS: Do you still want to be the president of Saxon at 60?

GW: It depends on where everything goes. It depends on how my kids evolve. It depends on how business evolves. It depends on how the world evolves. I want to keep shifting toward the fun part, but right now work is fun. Saxon Shoes is fun. We’re in a growth mode. I’m out there looking for other things that might make sense for us to do that could grow the footprint of Saxon Shoes.

RBS: What are your goals for five or 10 years from now?

GW: Be a good husband, parent, son and friend. Hopefully to be able to wear flip-flops, a T-shirt, short pants and nobody knows who I am. That’s one of my goals.

RBS: Do people stop you on the street?

GW: I’m a retailer, so that makes me visible. It doesn’t make me better or worse, it just makes me more visible, so, yes, I get seen everywhere and that’s a nice thing. Right now it’s a nice thing, but my goal would be as we go forward to figure out some way to disappear off into the sunset.