About Us

Serving Marion County Since 1972

Family owned and Operated!!

Keith's Story

Shoe Fair opened it's doors on Thursday, August 15, 1972, but how we got to this point is a story within it's self.

Friends J.D. Tucker of Tucker's Men Shop and R.M. Fowler of Mullins Department Store began discussing the possibility of opening a shoe store somewhere between Mullins and Marion, SC. R.M. had a partner in Elizabethtown, NC that had opened a shoe store there and he thought the concept would work in Mullins. The biggest problem would be to find someone who they could trust and depend on to run the store as each of them had their own business to look after.

J.D. suggested that Keith Herring (me), a young college student working for him, would be a great choice. R.M. was understandability skeptical about turning over the reins to a "snot-nossed" 19 year old (my description). J.D. didn't waver and asked R.M. to stop by his shop and watch how Keith interacted with the customers. This was during the Christmas season of 1971. I remember Mr. R.M. stopping by that day but I had no idea why he was there. Long story short, I must have made a good impression because it wasn't but a couple of days later that J.D. asked me if I would interested in running a shoe store.

I was getting ready to start my 4th semester at Francis Marion College where, as I now tell my kids, I was majoring in "spades". Of course even with a doctorate in "spades", chances of landing a job would be tough, so I jumped at the opportunity. I finished that semester while J.D. and R.M. finalized the details of the store. That summer I spent working back and forth between the men's shop and construction of the shoe store. I'll never forget the day that R.M. and myself pulled the concrete floor using a 2 X 4. I didn't think we would ever get done.

Fast forward a couple of years. At this time, I bought into Shoe Fair as a full partner. J.D. and R.M. always looked out for me while letting me make my own mistakes to learn from. Both of my original partners have passed and the sole ownership of Shoe Fair, Mullins is now the "snot-nossed kid's" thanks to two great partners.

Shoe Fair had it's start in Mullins, SC. Keith Herring the owner/manager is married to the former Marsha Boyette.

Keith opened Shoe Fair in Mullins in August of 1972. One of his part-time workers was a petit high school young lady named Marsha. As fate would have it, she graduated high school in May and married Keith in August 1973. Marsha enrolled at Francis Marion University and graduated in May 1977 all the while working part-time at Shoe Fair. Keith and Marsha now have 3 children.

This is truly a family owned and operated "Family" shoe store.

Justin's Story

That is my Dad's Story Now it is time to tell mine.

I am Justin Herring the Middle child of Keith and Marsha. I have been working at the store on and off since the age of 13. After graduating with a degree in Information Technology. I was working in that field, I received a call from my dad asking if would come back to help at the store, that was 2007.

By 2015 things in the shoe business were changing quickly. Our largest vendor (Nike) was limiting the items they were allowing us to purchase. Nike had just pulled away all Jordan Brand shoes from us and we knew it was only a matter of time before they would pull Nike from independent retailers nationwide. We had to make changes, we just didn't know what that was going to be. After visiting a good friend's store a few hours away, I knew exactly what changes we needed to make. The first change was our name. Shoe Fair had us pigeoned holed into shoes and we were about to venture into unknown territory by adding Clothes and Gift Items. Keith and I went back and forth with many names but always came back to Eagle Bay Outfitters.

In February 2016 we went to our first Clothing show, It was a challenge to get some of the big brands we wanted to take us seriously because we still had not changed over to the new name. It was a struggle but we landed accounts with Southern Tide, Vineyard Vine, Southern Marsh, Drake Waterfowl and Simply Southern.

The Following Year we replaced the old with the new, Eagle Bay Outfitters. We still pay homage to Shoe Fair with it's Logo over our doors.