Two Chelsea High School graduates are opening a new business called Sneaker Retriever in Dexter.

John Weinberg and Jonathan Royce have been friends since they were both 13, and for the last five years the two of them have been planning to open a store together.

“Recently, we finally had the resources to look at brick and mortar, and here we are,” Weinberg said.

While the original idea behind the store started with sports memorabilia, giving the “sneaker” part to the name, the inventory Weinberg and Royce plan to stock is in no way limited to athletic items.

“It started as just shoes, but then as it became more of a reality, we asked, hey, can we just open up a shoe store in the area and be successful?” Weinberg said. “So it’s kind of branched into other items.”

Royce added that Weinberg’s love for “all things cultural” has been a huge drive in the way the business will be set up.

“He’s always had a passion for these particular aspects of American culture,” Royce said. “And it has materialized, however many years later, as a physical reality, in terms of sharing that passion with others.”

Weinberg is at the store for most of his day now, organizing inventory, setting up the floor layout, and getting the hang of their point-of-sale system.

“I’ve always had a knack for creating interesting environments and setting them up,” Weinberg said. “People would come into my basement and there were a lot of conversation starters, and it was just a fun place to be. And I would say that the store is morphing into that. That’s the intent.”

Sneaker Retriever’s business model will also have an emphasis on community involvement.

“I want it to be a place where people want to hang out, come watch the game,” Weinberg said. “We do want to be really involved with the community. We want to support athletics. We want to support music, programs, academics. It can be through products that we can donate and it can be through our budget.”

An official launch date for the store has not been set, but Weinberg and Royce are hoping to be open and ready for business before the end of November.

“It’ll be very inviting,” Royce said. “I want it to be a place where kids want to hang out, where people want to hang out.”

Photos courtesy of John Weinberg