Challenge: The Children’s Shoe market was becoming increasingly competitive and Stride Rite wanted to insure that it retained long-term relevance and leadership in the marketplace.

Objective: Help Stride Rite better understand customers and prospects of the company’s brands and identify potential marketing and licensing opportunities for the company.

Solution: Plan-it conducted an exploratory profile of childhood educators’ attitudes to identify psychographic trends among children and families, and the resulting impact on brand and buying behavior in the footwear category. Plan-it also utilized ethnographic techniques to replicate a shoe retailer showroom that provided moms with a real world shopping experience as they made footwear shopping decisions and responded to merchandising efforts, including a new in-store collateral system.

Result: Plan-it’s work and insights helped guide product and merchandising decisions, and were used to make long-term planning decisions for the Stride Rite brand. Today, Stride Rite is one of the top children’s shoe brands chosen by moms.