Scenes from O’Fallon’s Grand Opening – March 22
O’Fallon Store Grand Opening – March 22-24
Alpine Shop is pleased to announce the Grand Opening of it’s O’Fallon, Illinois store at 1855 W. US Hwy 50, less than a mile east of St. Clair Square.
Featuring over 8600 square feet of outdoor adventure gear and clothing, including our first complete Trek bicycle shop, the new O’Fallon location represents Alpine Shop’s first brick and mortar store outside of the state of Missouri.
Alpine Shop invites everyone to join us Friday, March 22 through Sunday, March 24 for our Grand Opening celebration. Friday’s events include a ribbon cutting and flag raising by the city of O’Fallon at 11:40 am and a fund raising happy hour from 5 to 7 pm that evening. Sponsored by The North Face, Alpine Shop will provide free food and drink for the affair, and will sell pint glasses for $5.
All proceeds will go towards supporting the Caring Hearts Food Co-Op in O’Fallon. Patrons are also invited to “Spin to Win” to win prizes from The North Face & Alpine Shop along with gift certificates and discount coupons.
On Saturday, March 23, Alpine Shop welcomes the O’Fallon YMCA to our new location as they bring their portable climbing wall for Columbia Sportswear‘s Tough Mother Competition to see who can get the fastest time to the top. Saturday is also Military Appreciation Day with a 15 percent discount for everyone with a valid military ID. Live entertainment will play from 5 to 7 pm at Columbia Sportswear’s “Omni-Ice” Cream Happy Hour (even if the weather convinces us to feature something besides ice cream).
Sunday, March 24 will give our customers a chance to compete in Patagonia’s Go Green Olympics inside the store. Do you have what it takes to complete all of the activities? If you do, you could win some great prizes.
Prizes for the weekend donated by The North Face, GoPro, Columbia Sportswear, Mountain Hardwear and more.
We Appreciate Your Patience & Your Business
Our customers’ responses to this year’s Cyber Deals were far beyond anything we’d ever experienced on AlpineShop.com before. So far beyond, in fact, that our site did not function as it should have at many times during the past three days (November 26–28). We apologize if our site has been unresponsive while you’ve tried to shop with us.
We thank you for your business, and we hope you’ll bear with us as we work to discover the exact cause of the problem. We have a plan in place to attack these issues and hope to have them all implemented in by early next week. Our goal, as always, is to accommodate each and every one of our customers who are looking to shop with us on-line at alpineshop.com as seamlessly as possible.
If you have found any problems while shopping at alpineshop.com, we ask you to either leave a comment below, send an e-mail to customercare (at) alpineshop.com or call us at 1-888-347-2879. We want to do everything we can to make your experience with Alpine Shop as perfect as possible.
Black Friday & Small Biz Saturday Early Bird Specials
Small Business Saturday
Saturday, November 24 is a big day for everyone at Alpine Shop. It’s the third annual Small Business Saturday, when people across the country come out and shop to support their favorite local businesses. We celebrate our 39th birthday here in the St Louis area next month and we look forward to serving your outdoor adventure needs for 39 more thanks to your continued patronage to a local small business.
To celebrate this day, we will provide $50 in Alpine Shop Cash to the first 25 people to walk through the doors of any of our three stores. This Alpine Shop Cash will work pretty much like cash (with some exceptions) and will only be good on Small Business Saturday, 11/24, during normal store hours. You can also get a one-time $25 statement credit from American Express when you use your registered or linked American Express Card on Small Business Saturday to make a purchase of $25 or more at a small business.
We hope to see you in our stores on Saturday, Nov. 26!
Black Friday Specials
While we’re big fans of any day that has become as synonymous with shopping as Black Friday is, we’ve never been that excited at the prospect of standing in line for hours only to find out that the store had exactly two of the heavily promoted items you were looking for and both were grabbed two seconds after open.
So, we offer something similar to what we do on Small Business Saturday. We’ll provide $25 in Alpine Shop Cash to the first 25 people who walk through our doors at any of our locations. They’re only good that day, Friday, Nov. 23; but they work just like cash in our stores (with a few exceptions). See you then!
Alpine Shop, Grassroots Outdoor Alliance and Marmot Target $10k for Conservation Alliance
ST. LOUIS: This November, Alpine Shop, the Grassroots Outdoor Alliance (Grassroots), a buying group of nearly 40 independent specialty retailers with 80 plus stores across the United States, and Marmot Mountain LLC, a leading outdoor clothing, apparel and equipment manufacturer, will be working closely together to raise up to $10,000 for the Conservation Alliance, one of the outdoor industry’s most esteemed environmental conservation organizations. Promoted through Grassroots retailers during the month of November, $10 from the sale of any Marmot products—$99.00 or more—will go directly to the Conservation Alliance.
“Alpine Shop’s Mission states ‘We love and need the mountains, trails, rivers and wild places. They nourish our spirit.’ The Conservation Alliance is dedicated to precisely these areas and this is a great opportunity for us to help support them, ” says Todd Oswald, Marketing Director for Alpine Shop.
Since its creation in 1989, the Conservation Alliance has been heralded for its preservation of wild places where outdoor enthusiasts recreate and has played a key role in protecting rivers, trails, wild lands and climbing areas. “We’re extremely proud of Conservation Alliance’s important work and want to do our part to help them succeed with their conservation efforts. While all of the Grassroots retail members support similar local organizations in their own communities, the Conservation Alliance is the only national organizations we all choose to support,” explains Roanne Miller, Grassroots President.
Tom Fritz, Marmot’s Vice President of Marketing explains, “Last year we ran this promotion with Grassroots to raise money from the sale of our PreCip™ products. This year we’re opening up the promotion to all Marmot product purchases to ensure that we hit our fundraising goal for the Conservation Alliance.” Marmot became a member of the Conservation Alliance in 2011 and remains committed to helping the vital non-profit reach its goals.
“This co-promotion is a great example of outdoor industry cooperation and environmental stewardship,” adds Miller. “We want customers to take advantage of this terrific opportunity to support their local retailer while also investing in the Conservation Alliance,” she adds.
About Alpine Shop:
Alpine Shop began life in 1973 as a small climbing shop. Today, through its three locations in Kirkwood, Chesterfield and Columbia, Mo., it serves almost every type of outdoor enthusiast—be they backpackers, campers, cyclists, hikers, paddlers, skiers, snowboarders or climbers—with a friendly and knowledgeable staff, cutting edge products and a wide variety of how-to clinics for all activity levels.
About Grassroots Outdoor Alliance (Grassroots):
Grassroots Outdoor Alliance unites independent outdoor retailers as a strong voice to protect and promote the experience of outdoor enthusiasts across the United States. To learn more about Grassroots Outdoor Alliance, visit our website at www.grassrootsoutdoors.com
About Marmot Mountain, LLC:
Marmot is an award-winning, globally distributed brand of high-performance, technical clothing, apparel and equipment. Since 1974, Marmot products have been worn by climbers, skiers, mountaineers and adventurers world-wide. Marmot works with professional mountain guides, world-class athletes and expeditions—pushing the limits of product innovation and technology—pioneering what is possible in the most extreme environments on earth. For more information about Marmot please visit www.marmot.com
About the Conservation Alliance:
The Conservation Alliance is an organization of outdoor businesses whose collective contributions support grassroots environmental organizations and their efforts to protect wild places where outdoor enthusiasts recreate. Alliance funds have played a key role in protecting rivers, trails, wild lands and climbing areas.
Membership in the Alliance is open to companies representing all aspects of the outdoor industry, including manufacturers, retailers, publishers, mills and sales representatives. The result is a diverse group of businesses whose livelihood depends on protecting our natural environment.
Since its inception in 1989, the Alliance has contributed more than $8.3 million to grassroots environmental groups. Alliance funding has helped save over 49.5 million acres of wild lands; 27 dams have either been stopped or removed; and the group helped preserve access to more than 17,000 miles of waterways and several climbing areas.
For complete information on the Conservation Alliance, see www.conservationalliance.com.
Deals, Deals and More Deals at Swap
Ever wonder what kind of bargains people find at Swap. Here’s a quick look at last night’s Opening Night at Alpine Shop Kirkwood.
19th Winter Swap Success Even Against Cardinals
Running an event like Alpine Shop’s Winter Swap involves coordinating hundreds of people over thousands of hours of planning and execution. What we can’t control, though, are those lovable little birds-on-bat, St Louis’ own baseball Cardinals. For the second time in a year, our home town’s favorite boys of summer have thrown an unexpected – but absolutely welcomed – monkey wrench into our plans.
When David Freese homered in the 11th inning to send the 2011 World Series to a game 7, our Women’s Ski and Snowboard Weekend kickoff party (the second weekend of our 18th Swap event) had to be cancelled after we had more than three quarters of our registered attendees cancel on us following the most exciting playoff game in major league baseball history. And, all of this happened just before midnight on a Thursday night. With Jeannie Thoren – our keynote speaker – scheduled to fly in the next morning from Chicago, we had to make the call based on what we know about St Louis. You see, St Louis in October belongs to the Cardinals. We had no chance. And let me tell you, our store was deserted- as was every other retail outlet in the Lou – on Friday, Oct. 28, 2011. Thankfully, Jeannie was able to change her flight plans for free and we didn’t waste anyone’s time as the Cardinals won their 10th World Series Championship that night.
Fast forward 358 days from there to Friday, Oct. 19 and the start of our 19th Annual Swap. This time we’re faced with Game 5 of the National League Championship Series – a clinch game for the Cardinals. But after all the hours we put into a Swap, there was no chance for us to cancel this event. Thankfully, we found St Louis still loves Swap no matter what else is going on. After helping us get things started with a rousing rendition of “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” (video to come), more than 400 people have walked through our doors just an hour into this year’s event. At $5 a person to enter, that means we have already raised over $2000 to donate to the Disabled Athletes Sports Association – the organization long-time benefactor Gateway Disabled Ski Program became a part of last year.
So, our thanks to St Louis and to everyone who has come out with us tonight to make our 19th Annual Winter Swap kick-off so successful.
Annual Coat Drive Begins Monday, October 22nd
Over the last four years, Alpine Shop customers have donated over 5300 coats to help those in need in our St Louis and Columbia communities during the winter. We’re asking for your help once again this year as Alpine Shop kicks off it’s seventh annual One Warm Coat Drive.
How It Works
Starting Monday, October 22, we’ll accept clean, gently-used coats and sweaters at each and every Alpine Shop location.
- Donate ONE coat, jacket or sweater and you’ll receive a coupon for 15% off any one clothing item.
- Donate TWO coats, the coupon will be worth 20% off.
- Donate THREE items and we’ll give you a coupon worth 25% off any one clothing item in our stores.
And it gets better… If we reach our goal of 1500 coats donated by Sunday, November 18, we’ll give away $150 gift cards to four lucky donors. You’ll receive one entry into the drawing for each and every item you donate.
NOTE: Alpine Shop will only give away one coupon to each customer during the coat drive no matter how many different times you donate. However, each item donated will still earn one entry into the gift card drawing. So, if you donate nine items, you’ll receive one 25% off coupon and nine entries into the drawing. If you came back the next day with three more items to donate, you’d receive three more entries into the drawing, but no additional coupon.
The 2012 One Warm Coat Drive will run from Monday, Oct. 22 through Sunday, November 18.
How to Donate
Alpine Shop has made donating simple. Just bring your clean, gently used coats, jackets and sweaters to any Alpine Shop location. Bring your coats inside the store and check them in with one of the store’s outfitters to make sure you receive your coupon and get entered into the drawing. Then, Alpine Shop and One Warm Coat take care of the rest. Donated coats will be split among organizations in St. Louis, including: Sunshine Ministries, St. Patrick Center, Coats for Kids and Edgewood Children’s Center.
Donate Unsold Swap Coats, as Well
For the first time ever, we’re also giving Swap participants the opportunity to join in the giving, as well. If a coat or jacket you enter into this year’s Winter Swap (October 19–21) doesn’t sell, you can choose to donate those goods into the One Warm Coat Drive and receive your coupon! When you pick up your swap credit and unsold items following the Swap, simply tell the friendly Alpine Shop outfitter working with you that you want to participate in the One Warm Coat Drive and they’ll take care of it for you.
Help Make a Difference
Here’s a little bit of what your donations have meant to the St. Patrick Center in St Louis.
Thanks again for thinking of SPC for your One Warm Coat Drive. The 300 coats we received were distributed immediately. Case Managers were able to support their clients and families as were people in the community in need. All of the coats were distributed within 2 days of receiving. It was especially gratifying with the quality (gently used) coats that clients received.
Thanks again to you and your customers for your support of our clients and community.
Regards,
Gene Smith
St. Patrick Center
About One Warm Coat
One Warm Coat is a national non-profit organization that supports and encourages coat drives. It helps individuals, groups, companies and organizations across the country collect coats and deliver them to local agencies that distribute the coats free to people in need. More than one million coats have been provided to those in need at no cost since its inception in 1992.
Find the Best Adventures Near You with Alpine Shop & RootsRated
Outdoor guide site RootsRated is set to launch in partnership with Grassroots Outdoor Alliance retailer Alpine Shop this week to provide locals and visitors to the St. Louis area with a highly usable guide for discovering local experts’ favorite places for outdoor recreation.
RootsRated is, simply put, an outdoor travel guide. Ever find yourself traveling to a city, wondering where you can rock climb or trail run when you get there? Are you new to your area, or looking to try a new sport? With RootsRated, the best local outdoor experiences are at your fingertips.
This is “expertly-curated” information, which means our local experts have selected their favorite spots for you. You won’t have to wade through dozens of options before making a choice; the 5 or 10 best local spots are right there, so you can pick one and get out there. If you need a piece of gear before heading out, you’ll be able to connect with Grassroots Outdoor Alliance retailers in that region — the same experts who’ve provided the content.
Here’s what Alpine Shop Marketing Director Todd Oswald had to say about the project:
“We’re already a hub of local knowledge for trails, paddling routes, and crags in the St Louis and Columbia regions. RootsRated will give us an innovative way to become the digital hub as well. We’re looking forward to giving our customers another resource to help them get outside themselves.”
RootsRated is going to empower adventurous people to find the most memorable experiences; this platform is the perfect resource for those in search of authentic local knowledge. Find your favorite local places to go and things to do with www.rootsrated.com.
Alpine Shop’s Pedorthist Picks Footwear for the Fall
Introducing Angie Bono, Alpine Shop’s certified pedorthist and senior bootfitter. (We’ll explain what that means in just a second.) We asked her to give us some background on what she does and what she likes for fall in the footwear department at Alpine Shop.
Where does my passion for helping people with their feet come from?
I have worked at Alpine Shop for 13 years. About three years into my employment here, the Shop sent me to a professional boot fitting class as part of its efforts to improve the quality of our service for our customers. That class taught me my first lessons about the biomechanics of the human foot, boot anatomy, how to dial in a fit and where the majority of common foot problems originate .
About the same time, my mom started having a terrible time with her feet, suffering from both plantar fasciitis and tarsal tunnel syndrome. She worked for 32 years at the phone company walking on concrete floors and climbing metal ladders. She always just wore a pair of simple white tennis shoes. Watching a loved one suddenly having to hobble around like an old woman because of excruciating pain just killed me.
Then a light went on: If I could help people with their feet through my job… Maybe they wouldn’t have end up with the same problems like my Mom!
I’ve spent the last eight years continuing to further my education and my skills regarding the footwear we sell here at Alpine Shop and the correct way to fit that footwear to best help our customers.
I’m now a Certified Pedorthist, which means I am a professional health care specialist dealing in the use of footwear and supportive devices to address conditions which affect the feet and lower limbs. I’m trained in the assessment of your lower limb anatomy and biomechanics, and also the appropriate use of corrective footwear, including shoes, shoe modifications, orthotics and other devices.
I’ve helped everyone from professional athletes to 70-year-old men just starting to hike to try to stay in shape. I’ve outfitted hundreds of boy scouts and helped many, many others along the way with everything from flip-flops to dress shoes. My passion is being able to help others with their feet. If I’d known back then what I know now, maybe I could have prevented my Mom’s problems from developing. Now, I’m here to help you!
Angie Bono C.Ped.
What’s cool this fall and winter in footwear?
From my closet to yours:
One of my favorite days of the retail year is when we get in our new Danskos. If you don’t have a pair yet; they will change your life. Eight different Dansko collections carry the American Podiatric Medical Association seal of approval. (That means they have been found beneficial to foot health.) As Alpine Shop’s Certified Pedorthist, senior boot fitter, and general “I can totally help you with your feet!” person, I LOVE Danskos.
This season’s fall lineup of Danskos looks really, really nice. And, by the way, some of the colors are in limited edition! Come in and get that pair of Paint Splatter; they won’t be here for long.
The COOLEST Men’s Winter Boots
The North Face Back to Berkley 68. It speaks of The North Face’s History and roots. BUT it doesn’t just look cool; it’s loaded with sweet features and EXTRA RED LACES!
It has Primaloft® insulation to keep your feet warm, and looking good!
The bottom of the shoe (the outsole) is made out of a temperature activated rubber, that gets harder as the temperature gets lower. It’s called IcePick® technology, because the rubber becomes spiky points that dig in to slippery snowy or icy terrain.
So: Good looking, super warm, and it bites into the weather conditions.
Trail Running. Salomon is where it’s at.
Introducing the Salomon XR Mission for Men and Women.
These shoes are designed for slightly less technical trails than some of the previous options we have carried from Salomon. It is absolutely perfect for harder packed surfaces, like well defined trails in drier weather. It is bulked up with all of the cushioning that would take you from light trail to road runs.
This shoe has “muscle,” and by muscle I mean three areas of scientifically placed cushion that roll you through heel strike, mid foot stance, and on your toe-off phase of gait.
Lastly this shoe has an amazing fore-foot fit. (Say that three times fast!) It’s new to Salomon and it’s called Sensi-Fit. It’s a stretchy area in the forefoot that helps fits medium to a wider fore-foot. More importantly it allows the forefoot to expand naturally upon impact.
So far this is my favorite new Salomon, just ordered my pair yesterday in this color:
That’s what’s hot for this fall in footwear!