Salomon president on retail expansion in the US

About 80 years after its founding in the French Alps, Salomon is looking to make a bigger mark in the US with a new store in NYC.

Originally established as a winter sports company, the outdoor performance brand has spent decades building credibility among skiers, trail runners, and outdoor enthusiasts. More recently, however, its sneakers and apparel have become staples of modern sport style, helping connect the brand to a younger generation of consumers.

And now, with its newest outpost in New York City’s Flatiron District, the brand’s seventh store in the country, Salomon is looking to capitalize on that momentum while remaining true to its roots.

In a recent conversation with Retail Brew, President and GM of the Americas Steve Doolan spoke about the importance of physical retail, and building brand awareness in the US.

This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

Tell me about the new store. Why New York? Why Flatiron? Why now?

Salomon ventured into retail about a decade ago, and had pulled back. And the brand is at what I would describe as a much more cohesive strategy around footwear [and] is really pushing in. We opened a store October 1, 2024, which is amazing to think that we’re almost at the two-year mark there, and we see great success. That store is definitely focused on the sports stock consumer and that part of our product range. Since then, we’ve opened a store in Williamsburg, most recently a store on the Upper West Side, and Flatiron has been in the works almost as long as the SoHo store. But finding the right location, one that we felt good about, and then obviously the build-out process have been a little bit more involved because we have wanted to really have a broader representation in terms of our product assortment.

It’s the biggest footprint that we’re going to have in New York City, and it’s going to be the most broadly representative of all the exciting products that we have to serve people that are out there, you know, whether it’s exploring their city streets or their trails in our local neighborhood, or maybe able to get out there and adventure, whether it’s, you know, in a local forest, maybe in a state that’s chasing them, or somewhere across the Americas.

Why do you think a huge flagship with such a wide product assortment made sense?

I don’t think we deem this a flagship just yet. We’re definitely calling it a brand store, but it is a broader representation in terms of the product assortment than we’ve had. Maybe the second answer is we’re being really thoughtful and judicious in terms of, “Hey, where are the stores that we want to open?” This is going to be our seventh store. In that process, what we found is it’s an opportunity for us to engage with the consumer one to one [and] create a very controlled environment to engage with those consumers, many of whom, it’s their first interaction with the brand.

Salomon is on the cusp of its 80th anniversary and is a legacy brand within the outdoor space. Obviously, coming from the winter sports side initially, but for many, they are just discovering Salomon. For us to be able to create an environment for them to do that is really exciting. It’s really meaningful, and that’s exactly what we’ve heard from individuals when they come into our stores, whether it’s in Melrose or Bucktown or Chicago, or the store on the Upper West Side that we opened just a few weeks ago.

How have you dealt with all the challenges that lots of retailers are facing, like an uncertain economy, tariffs, and geopolitical tensions?

We’re really fortunate to have a very simplistic view: What are our long-term goals? By taking this long-term view, it allows us to really be thoughtful in terms of the choices that we make and allows us to really stay focused on what is really the most important piece: How do we drive demand and ultimately how do we broaden the aperture of Salomon?

I’ve been in this business at Salomon a little bit more than two and a half years now, and when I started, there was research that had just been done on the inside side that showed that we had an awareness of about 6% across the US. That’s a huge opportunity. We’re most focused on how we build brand affinity, how we bring people into Salomon.