How a Hand-Addressed Letter Built a National Program

The Origin Story of Brown’s Shoe Fit Co.’s Local Loop

There’s a certain kind of business owner who doesn’t wait for the phone to ring. Mark Toms is that kind of person.

When Toms opened the Brown’s Shoe Fit Co. location in Cedar Falls, Iowa, he did what a lot of new small business owners talk about but few actually do: he sat down, thought about every person and organization in the area who might benefit from quality footwear, and wrote them each a letter. By hand. One by one.

“When we first opened, I would send out coupons and hand-addressed letters to any place I thought I could sell shoes to — in or out of the store. One of those letters landed in the Allen Hospital UnityPoint gift shop.”

— Mark Toms, Cedar Falls

That single envelope, addressed and sent somewhere around 2019, quietly launched what would become one of the most meaningful partnerships Brown’s Shoe Fit has ever built — and the very first relationship in what is now a nationwide program called Local Loop.

What Is Local Loop?

Local Loop is Brown’s Shoe Fit Co.’s community partnership program — built on a simple but powerful belief: a local shoe store can be more than a place to buy shoes. It can be a neighbor, a supporter, and a genuine partner to the organizations that hold communities together.

Businesses, hospitals, fire departments, schools, agricultural programs, nonprofits — these are the people Local Loop is built to serve. Each relationship is unique, but the core idea is the same: Brown’s shows up, offers real value, and gives something back. No corporate formula, no impersonal transaction. Just a handshake — or, in Mark Toms’s case, a hand-addressed envelope — and a commitment to do business the way it used to be done.

Local Loop partners receive real benefits: exclusive employee or member discounts, workboot accounts, access to Brown’s expertise, and the knowledge that a portion of every purchase goes back to the organization they care about. For the communities on the other end, it means resources that fill gaps, fund equipment, and support the people doing essential work every day.

Where It Started:

Allen Hospital UnityPoint

When that first hand-addressed letter landed in the Allen Hospital gift shop in Cedar Falls, it opened a door. Allen Hospital staff were eventually welcomed to a vendor event — and what started as a simple shoe sale grew into something far more significant. Brown’s began hosting pop-up events at the hospital, offering employees a meaningful discount and donating a percentage of every sale back to the Allen Hospital Auxiliary.

The Auxiliary is a volunteer-driven organization that turns community generosity into tangible human good — funding everything from life-saving medical equipment to scholarship support for nursing students. The partnership between Brown’s and Allen Hospital was a natural fit: people who spend long days on their feet getting quality footwear, while the funds raised go directly back to the community they serve.

What started as one day, once a year, grew into twice-a-year, two-day events — because demand built, schedules filled, and the partnership simply worked.

“It’s a great way for Brown’s to get out in the community and truly do good. Whether it’s the kitchen staff, the custodial crew, nurses, doctors, techs, or administrators — everyone deserves comfortable, quality shoes that keep their feet happy and their bodies able to endure the long, often demanding days that come with working in a hospital. And getting to donate to such a fantastic cause in the process? That’s what it’s all about.”

— Stewart McCaskill, Owner, Brown’s Shoe Fit Cedar Falls

Allen Hospital UnityPoint holds a special distinction in the Brown’s Shoe Fit story: it was the very first Local Loop partner. Everything that came after — every hospital, every school, every fire department, every community event — traces its roots back to that one relationship in Cedar Falls.

Growing the Idea Across Communities

The Allen Hospital partnership proved what was possible, and Brown’s Cedar Falls didn’t stop there. That same spirit took them to MercyOne Waterloo, MercyOne Cedar Falls, and MercyOne Oelwein — bringing the same employee discount events and community-first approach to healthcare workers across the Cedar Valley region.

But Local Loop was never only about hospitals. Brown’s Cedar Falls has also packed up their trailer — loaded with shoes and staffed by people who genuinely love what they do — and brought that same energy to events like the Jessup, Iowa FFA, supporting young agricultural leaders and their families.

“We love packing up our trailer full of shoes and sharing our passion to be a service to our community in the most honest way possible.”

— Mark Toms

Every stop, every event, every pair of shoes sold carries the same core conviction: show up, serve people well, and give something back.

From Cedar Falls to Coast to Coast

Mark Toms, now serving as Brown’s Shoe Fit’s eCommerce Manager, took the lesson he learned writing those hand-addressed letters and built it into something much larger. Local Loop is now a cornerstone of the company’s Local Anywhere campaign — an initiative built on a belief the entire Brown’s team holds deeply: We want to be your local store, even if we don’t have a storefront in your community.

Independent shoe stores are disappearing. The kind of place where someone knows your name, knows your foot, and takes the time to find you the right fit — those stores are becoming rare. Brown’s Shoe Fit Co. is one of the few that’s not only surviving but growing, and the reason is simple: they’ve refused to stop acting like a small-town shoe store, no matter how large the operation becomes.

Through the Local Loop network, Brown’s can reach employees, members, and communities that may be miles from the nearest physical location — and treat them like neighbors anyway. For customers, it’s a chance to feel what used to be normal: that your purchase actually matters, that the person on the other end of the transaction genuinely cares, and that spending your money with a local business does real good in the world.

That feeling started with a hand-addressed letter to a hospital gift shop in Waterloo, Iowa. Today, it’s reaching communities across the country.

And it all started here.

Become a Local Loop Partner

Interested in becoming a Local Loop partner? Whether you represent a business, hospital, school, fire department, or community organization, we’d love to connect. Visit us at brownsshoefitco.com and let’s talk about what a partnership could look like for your community.