The Retail Council of Canada (RCC) announced that John Stanton, president and founder of The Running Room Canada, will be honored as the 2011 inductee into the Canadian Retail Hall of Fame. Stanton was nominated and selected by a distinguished panel of current and former retail executives, as well as representatives from the financial, academic and consulting communities.
“Mr. Stanton is being honoured for his passionate commitment to promoting retail as a career and for his contributions to the retail industry in Canada,” says Diane J. Brisebois, President and CEO, Retail Council of Canada. “He continues to give generously of his time to promote retail as a career and his unwavering support has had a tremendous impact on retail’s future leaders and the industry as a whole.”
Inductees to the Canadian Retail Hall of Fame are executives working in retail who have demonstrated leadership in advancing and promoting retail as a career within their company and in the industry, and are strong advocates of retail education and training. Hall of Fame inductees are seen as inspirational leaders, promoting and encouraging young people to pursue careers in retail, current employees to acquire more skills to advance in retail, supporting the development of retail courses in schools, and lending support to organizations promoting retail as a career and retail education. Through their actions, these individuals have demonstrated that retail training and education have played an important role in the success of their companies.
About John Stanton
A three-kilometer fun run with his sons in 1981 was the catalyst for the then out-of-shape, overweight John Stanton to realize he had to change his lifestyle. A food industry executive who smoked two packs of cigarettes a day, he began running secretly before dawn because he felt self-conscious about having his neighbors see “this chubby little guy” who could only run from lamp post to lamp post before having to take a walk break.
John went on to run over 60 marathons, hundreds of road races, and numerous triathlons, including the Hawaiian World Championship Ironman competition. His pre-dawn runs would ultimately become John Stanton’s 10:1 run/walk combination that has helped close to a million people do everything from learn to run to complete marathons, upright and smiling.
The first store a meeting place for runners, opened in 1984 in an 8×10 foot room of an old house shared with a hairdressing shop in Edmonton. More than 25 years later, the Running Room is one of North America’s most recognized names in running and walking. His sons John Jr. and Jason are now partners with John, in the family owned company, with over 100 stores and 1,300 employees in Canada and the USA.
A best-selling Canadian author of eight books on running and walking, John Stanton released his newest book in April 2010, the much anticipated Running: The Complete Guide to Building Your Running Program. Maclean’s magazine’s Canada Day Honour Roll named the Running Room founder one of 10 Canadians making a difference in our nation for his contribution to health through fitness. John Stanton is a member of the Alberta Business Hall of Fame. He is recipient of the Dr. Harold N. Segall Award of Merit, recognizing his significant contribution to the prevention of cardiovascular disease and the promotion of cardiovascular health in Canadians. In 2010, The Canadian Medical Association awarded him the Award for Excellence in Health Promotion. He is a Member of the Order of Canada and the Hon. Lt. Col. of the Loyal Edmonton Regiment (4 PPCLI).
John is regularly featured on CBC, CTV, Global Television, the National Post, the Globe and Mail, and numerous radio and television programs across Canada and the United States.
This award will be presented to Mr. Stanton on behalf of the retail industry at the Excellence in Retailing Awards Dinner on Monday, June 6, 2011. The dinner, part of STORE 2011 – Canada’s Retail Conference, takes place at the Toronto Congress Centre from 6:30 p.m. – 9:30 p.m.
