The West Acres store was a small 7,700-square-foot shop almost entirely devoted to sporting goods, particularly athletic apparel. That year the company opened a third store in Fargo, at the West Acres Shopping Center. It opened stores in Mankato, Minnesota, and Waterloo, Iowa, that year as well.Īthletic shoes and clothing were introduced at Scheels stores in 1972. In 1969 Scheels was incorporated in North Dakota. Another store started operations that year in Bismarck, North Dakota, followed by a store in Great Falls, Montana, in 1968. In 1965 the first Scheels store to be located in a mall opened in St. Scheels store managers found that sporting goods were easier to sell than hardware, and sporting goods sales drove the steady expansion of the Scheels chain over the next four decades. Robert Scheel, a third son of Frederick M., joined the business in 1964.Įxpanding the Sporting Goods Line: 1965-88 That year Scheels also relocated its Moorhead store, doubling its size, and shortly thereafter moved the downtown Fargo store to a location about a block away. In 1962, the company opened a second Fargo location, a hardware and sporting goods store at the Southside Shopping Center. More and more sports lines were added over the following years in response to customer interest. In a propitious move, Scheels added a small selection of sporting goods to its hardware stores in 1954. Several new stores opened in the early 1950s: first in Wheaton and Breckenridge, Minnesota, both communities a short distance from the Fargo-Moorhead area, then a few years later in Jamestown, North Dakota, about 100 miles west of Fargo, and finally, in a great leap west, a Scheels store opened in Billings, Montana, in 1955. A second son, Charles, became active in the business the next year.
joined the family business in 1946 after a stint as a Marine fighter pilot in World War II. The Fargo store also moved to a new downtown location. Both stores were converted to Scheels hardware stores.īetween 19, Scheel opened hardware stores in Casselton, Hillsboro, and Fairmount, North Dakota, all small communities in the Fargo area. in 1928 with his partner Memfred Nelson and the Swanson Hardware Co. stayed in the hardware business, moving to the Fargo-Moorhead area on the North Dakota/Minnesota border. In 1927 Carl "Charlie" Buth and Chris Kuehl took over management of the Sabin store.įrederick M. The farm implement line was dropped in 1925. At the time, the store was selling hardware and farm implements. Scheel, son of the founder, bought the business in 1919 after returning from service with the U.S. The total cost of the store was $600.įrederick M. The proceeds were used as the down payment for the first Scheels store, a hardware and general merchandise store in the tiny town of Sabin, Minnesota, near the North Dakota border. The field produced 300 bushels of potatoes, which the family sold for $300. The couple gave their children, Frederick M., age 10, and Margaret, age 8, the job of planting and tending a three-acre potato plot. Scheel, a German immigrant, moved to northwestern Minnesota from Chicago with his wife, Augusta. In the early years of the 20th century, Frederick A. The company is owned by store managers, employees, and the Scheel family and is led by Steve Scheel, great-grandson of the founder.Ī Chain of General and Hardware Stores: 1902-64 Scheels' newest locations are two-level Scheels All Sports superstores of over 100,000 square feet, organized as "boxes" containing several separately managed specialty shops. As sales of sporting goods grew, hardware sales were gradually phased out. The company added a line of sporting goods to its stores in the mid-1950s and steadily expanded across the Midwest over the next several decades. The first Scheels store, opened over a century ago, was a general merchandise and hardware store. Its stores span seven states: North Dakota, South Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Nebraska, Montana, and Iowa. Centered in Fargo, North Dakota, Scheels has nearly 25 retail locations in mid-size Midwestern cities. Hunters, cyclists, golfers, runners and nearly all other sports and outdoor enthusiasts can find the gear they need at the stores operated by Scheels All Sports Inc.
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