Competent decision making and good timing have brought Jim Van Veen to our Sandy Springs Phidippides location as our manager-on-deck, but Jim’s running career has one story that defies the logic of a well-made plan. During his senior high school year, Jim qualified for the state meet, traveled an hour to get there, warmed up, and discovered that he had forgotten his jersey. He worried. His coach panicked and started to improvise a jersey out of her own shirt. A teammate that had come to the meet to support Jim asked what on earth was going on. When Jim told him, the teammate got a strange look on his face. Jim’s teammate had a dream the night before that Jim would forget his jersey for his meet the next day, so he brought his own jersey for Jim, just in case.
Jim’s start in running was more down-to-earth, but has also had positive outcomes. A friend encouraged Jim to run track in junior high, and he won the 800 in a sprint finish in his first meet. The thrill of that first success led him to set goals for himself. Continued experience made him realize that, for him, running wasn’t necessarily a "win-or-don’t win" sport, and that although he did meet his objective goals, running was a matter of succeeding on many levels. Progress can’t be faked; it’s in direct measure to hard work.
After receiving his degree in Communications from FSU, Jim worked at and managed a family-owned running store in Melbourne, FL for two and a half years. He enjoyed fitting people for shoes and then seeing these customers in their shoes at the races. Jim had planned to work in the running store until he found a job in his field, but found that the running industry agreed with him. He and his wife recently moved to Atlanta to live in a bigger city with more music, more festivals, and a larger and more diverse running community with more training and racing opportunities.
Jim visited the Ansley Mall Phidippides during one of his trips to Atlanta to run the Peachtree Road Race when he was in high school. He says this was the first time he had seen an entire store dedicated to running. In addition, the store was, he says, "museum-like" with its collection of running memorabilia from Jeff’s Olympic days. When Jim and his wife moved to Atlanta, Jim looked at the running stores in the area and liked the welcoming environment of Phidippides, which he remembered from his high school visit. In another instance of fortuitous timing, Jim inquired about a management position just as a management opportunity became available at the Sandy Springs store. What good fortune!
Jim will begin his (friendly) reign as manager at Sandy Springs sometime soon, and he looks forward to learning from the store and employees (and customers, too) while using his previous experiences to extend the store’s reputation for knowledge and customer service. Helpful in this pursuit will be Jim’s slight obsession with both running and lifestyle-type shoes. He is interested in shoe history as well as shoe functionality, and considers himself a collector. If you have a question about shoe culture, I have no doubt Jim will be happy to expound at length on any shoe of interest. I think it’s nice when a person’s hobbies and intense interests integrate so well with his vocation, and this will benefit our store while it keeps Jim happy and occupied looking at people’s feet and unique shoe selections all day long, every day.
Jim’s other interest and activities include playing guitar, screenprinting shirts, and relishing his "Seinfeld" fandom.
