Dick’s Sporting Goods is getting ready to shutter its last three remaining Moosejaw stores in the U.S. and completely dissolve the brand, Metro Times has learned.
Multiple workers confirmed the impending closures to Metro Times, though the company’s corporate office did not respond to multiple requests for comment. The workers say the stores will remain open through close of business on Saturday, and what remains of the brand’s online store will fold into Dick’s Public Lands subsidiary.
The outdoor recreation retail brand was founded in Michigan in 1992 and purchased by Dick’s Sporting Goods last year. The Pennsylvania-based company swiftly moved to close 11 brick and mortar Moosejaw stores across Arkansas, Colorado, Illinois, Kansas, Michigan, and Missouri, slashing hundreds of jobs. The Woodward Avenue store in Birmingham is its last store in Michigan, with other stores in Salt Lake City, Utah, and Bentonville, Arkansas.
One worker, who requested anonymity out of fear of retaliation, says they learned about the planned closure earlier this week. The news was shocking but not exactly a surprise, they say.
“We had an idea,” the worker says. “Like, we didn’t get any replenishment [of supplies] … And we were like, OK, something’s up, like, something’s up.”
Longtime friends Robert Wolfe and David Jaffe opened the first Moosejaw store in Keego Harbor before moving the flagship to Birmingham. The brand was beloved for its quirky “Moosejaw Madness” sensibility, and its slogan boasted it was “the most fun outdoor retailer on the planet.”
Upon the announcement of its acquisition in 2023, Dick’s said it planned to grow the company.
“We admire what Moosejaw has accomplished over the past 30 years as leaders in the outdoor industry and look forward to the opportunity to share insights and learn from one another,” Dick’s president Todd Spaletto said in a statement at the time. “We believe there’s potential to grow the Moosejaw business and provide compelling experiences and an expanded product assortment to its millions of loyal customers.”
However, our worker source says that the vibe shifted after the company was acquired by Dick’s, which implemented a dress code for workers and ended perks like offering returned items to employees.
“It was kind of a really wholesome company,” the worker says. “When Dick’s bought us, it kind of stripped away the love of what Moosejaw was.”
When Metro Times visited the Birmingham store on Friday, a worker would not confirm the closure. There was no markdown sale or any other signs the business was closing, though a table offered free swag like beer koozies and bumper stickers.
“It’s, like, totally not fair to the customer, not fair to other employees,” our source says.
The store had long stopped selling any Moosejaw-branded items, the source adds, which they believe in retrospect was a sign that the writing was on the wall.
Throughout the first two decades of the 2000s, various private equity firms began to acquire stakes in Moosejaw. In 2017, it was acquired by Walmart for $51 million in cash. In February 2023, Walmart agreed to sell the brand to Dick’s for an undisclosed sum.
“To see it go from this great thing that was built from the bottom up from Michiganders to literally being wiped off the face of the Earth … I have a passion for this company, and I’m just in pure disgust as to how this was handled,” our source says.
They add, “Dick’s bought us to just chew us up and spit us out.”
