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Wisconsin’s Eastbay Markets Snowboards, Upscale Shoes in New Catalogs.(Originated from The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel)

Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News August 2, 1996 | Hajewski, Doris Aug. 2–Eastbay Inc., the Wausau-based athletic shoe catalog com pany that went public last fall, will mail two new catalogs this fall that will offer snowboarding equipment and upscale shoes, including Allen-Edmonds.

Chief Financial Officer John Schaefer said the new business ventures gave the company an opportunity to make further use of an 8 million-name mailing list.

“We have some very good demographics on our list,” Schaefer said.

The idea for the dress shoe catalog, which probably will be named Step Up, came from John Stollenwerk, the owner of Allen-Edmonds and a member of Eastbay’s board of directors.

“We were giving John a tour,” Schaefer said. “He was surprised to see how many households we had in his ZIP code.” Stollenwerk lives in Me quon. eastbaycouponcodesnow.com eastbay coupon codes

The Step Up catalog will be aimed at the parents of the kids who buy Eastbay athletic shoes in upscale ZIP codes, and it won’t carry any Eastbay identifi cation. The catalog will offer shoes in the $150 price range, including brands such as Bir kenstock, Ecco, Amalfi, Rock port, Cole Haan and New Bal ance.

Eastbay President Harry Col corde said the new snowboard ing book was a natural fit for his company.

“It’s definitely the coming sport,” Colcorde said.

The most recent ski industry trade show had record atten dance, yet the ski business itself has slowed, Colcorde said. The reason is that kids are more in terested in snowboards than skis.

“We’ve got 7 1/2 million names of people between 12 and 24,” Colcorde said.

The snowboard catalog will offer boards, bindings, boots and clothing from manufactur ers that include The Limited; Palmer; part of the Ride line, in cluding Liquid; Switch, a new step-in binding; Airwalk; Vans; and part of Columbia’s Convert line.

Colcorde said some of the manufacturers initially were hesitant to sell through a cata log. But he said Eastbay con vinced them that the products would be sold with an emphasis on service rather than price. website eastbay coupon codes

He said Eastbay would em ploy snowboarding experts to counsel callers on binding set tings and would have a liberal return policy to make adjust ments as needed.

The snowboarding catalog, as yet unnamed, will be mailed in September, and the Step Up catalog will go out in October. A minimum of two additional cat alogs in each category will go out to between 200,000 and 400,000 customers.

Eastbay this week reported annual earnings of $5.4 million, up 35 percent from a year ago, on sales of $117.6 million, up 19 percent.

Hajewski, Doris