Dive Brief:
- Following the opening of its second store on Friday at Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota, hands-free footwear brand Kizik is planning to open a location at the King of Prussia Mall in Pennsylvania on June 14, marking its first East Coast store.
- Kizik will employ experiential retail concepts in both Mall of America and King of Prussia stores where shoppers can “experience first-hand the undeniable difference of Kizik’s proprietary technologies that spark the freedom to move with uninterrupted momentum,” according to the company.
- The company plans to continue its “fast-paced growth” into new distribution channels, including opening additional stores in Short Hills Mall in New Jersey and Newbury Street in Boston later this year, forming wholesale partnerships and expanding internationally, per the announcement.
Dive Insight:
For Kizik’s CEO Monte Deere, seeing the successful launch of its first store in Fashion Place Mall in Salt Lake City, Utah, last year confirmed the DTC brand’s growth plan.
“The feeling people have when they first try on our shoes is not something that can be replicated online,” Deere said in a statement.
Kizik reported 250% growth in 2022. Two years later, the brand is adding stores to America’s largest malls with more to come.
“Mall of America and King of Prussia are iconic shopping destinations,” Deere said in a statement. “When we observed the incredible consumer reception of our first store in Fashion Place Mall last year, we knew it was important to us to open more physical retail locations as part of our long-term growth strategy.”
Last month, Kizik opened its first experiential New York pop-up store to kickstart the brand’s recent brick-and-mortar expansion. The weekend-long pop-up in SoHo featured the brand’s five new silhouettes and Kizik’s new “Motion is Magic” brand platform with visual installations that react to movement.
Kizik plans to open a half dozen stores initially and expand to more than 500 wholesale locations in 2024, the company told Retail Dive in April. If the initial stores perform well, the company said it would add another nine stores by the end of 2025 for a total of 15.
To finance its growth plan, the company amended its credit facility with JPMorgan Chase late last year to increase Kizik’s revolver capacity from $10 million to $25 million. Under terms of the revised agreement, Kizik can further expand to $50 million, according to the press release.
