words // Nick Engvall
For nearly the last ten years, Keith Hufnagel's San Francisco based HUF has been supplying Northern California with skateboards, sneakers, and streetwear. What started from Keith's skills on a skateboard and a dream, has now evolved into a fledgling brand that is recognized worldwide.
In order to pursue the growth of the brand, which in recent years has grown into creating its own brand of footwear, HUF will be letting go of its lone standing retail location on San Francisco's Hayes Street. A new owner will take over soon and supply sneakers for those in the area and HUF will still maintain its Los Angeles retail store on Fairfax as well.
Read the goodbye letter from Mr. Hufnagel below.
Goodbye
March 8th, 2011 - staff
To Whom it may concern:
After 9 years of having retail spots in SF, I am selling our last SF shop on Hayes street. We had a great run in SF and I appreciate all the customers and friends we made through the shops over the years. As most of you know, I started my brand, HUF, through the shops. I never could anticipate how well it would be received and what it would grow into. In order to be the best I can be at producing clothing and footwear for my brand, I have to give up my original vision of having a shop where I sold other people’s brands. I’m pretty happy about the opportunity to focus on the HUF brand full-time and feel its time to pass the torch in SF to a new owner that will provide a cool, multi-line sneaker shop for the shoppers in Hayes. We will still be open for a little while in SF while the shop changes hands. We will continue to keep our HUF shop open on Fairfax in Los Angeles where we carry the complete HUF line as well as HUFshop only specialty product, from time to time. Being a skateboarder was a great launch pad for me to own a shop and the shops were a great opportunity to learn how to make clothing. Making clothes helped me learn to make shoes and skating in them helps me learn how to make them better. The business is an extension of myself and ever evolving. Many of the familiar faces you saw in the shops behind the counters over the years have moved on to help me at the brand with design, sales and marketing. The original HUF crew is alive and well. We look forward to bringing quality skateboard lifestyle apparel and footwear for years to come. If you are looking for something and can’t find it elsewhere, check out our site. www.hufsf.com . Thanks to everyone who ever set foot in a HUF shop in SF. We had a great time and hope you did too!
Sincerely,
Keith Hufnagel
