to America’s Coolest Stores 2023!

Our six America’s Coolest and additional 10 Cool Stores — each of which will be featured in INSTORE issues through summer 2024 — represent outstanding achievements in creativity, marketing savvy, company culture and individuality.

Each year, judges with expertise in architecture and store design, retail operations, visual merchandising, marketing and branding evaluate stores in multiple categories: the brand story, the look, the marketing, online presence, and what we here at INSTORE believe is the key to cool — individuality. As in past years, we divided the entries into two categories: Big Cool and Small Cool, based on staff size.

There is no one secret formula for being cool. And that may be the point. Each store is cool in its own way, and this year’s winners are cool in many ways that set them apart.

AMERICA’S COOLEST STORES 2023 SPONSORS

Greenwich St. Jewelers is designed to reflect its downtown New York environment, both pretty and gritty. Owners Jennifer Gandia and Christina Gandia Gambale demonstrate a commitment to maintaining a full-service shop in their Tribeca community and a dedication to sustainability and diversity within their company and within the jewelry industry as a whole.

Eliza Page was the first retail business to open in the 2nd Street District in downtown Austin. The original store was designed by owner Elizabeth Gibson with a flexibility that anticipated the recent renovation and updates, during which a permanent bracelet station and a private ear piercing room were added.

If you haven’t taken the time to enter yet, please consider doing so when we open the contest for entries again this month. Retailers have told us that the application process alone is motivational because it requires them to assess all aspects of their businesses and get around to things they’d been putting off, like having professional photos taken of their store interior and head shots of themselves.

And if you entered and weren’t chosen this time, feel free to update your entry and try again.

Thanks to all who took the time to enter this year.