With You Every Step, Episode 004:
From Trainee to Owner
Jozie Porter on Earning Ames & Building a Hometown Brand
This month, hosts Adam Smith and Craig Jarrard welcome Jozie Porter, owner and operator of Brown’s Shoe Fit in Ames, Iowa, for a story about proving yourself, earning the next opportunity, and treating every customer like a guest in your own home. Recorded at the Apex Waukee School Podcast Studio, the conversation traces Jozie’s path from a part-time job in high school to becoming, in Craig’s words, the president of her own company — and offers another firsthand look at how Brown’s grows people first.
A Friendship That Turned Into a Career
Jozie’s connection to Brown’s started almost by accident, through a high school friendship in Fort Dodge with Craig Jarrard’s daughter, Carson. That friendship led to a part-time job opening at Craig’s store — one that pulled Jozie away from a job at Hy-Vee and into Brown’s trainee program. What hooked her, by her own account, wasn’t the shoes. It was the people, and a head for numbers that Craig noticed almost right away.
A job meant to fund a semester at Iowa State quickly became something more. Jozie worked her way through the full trainee program, and by 22, she was running her own store in Algona, Iowa.
Proof Before Opportunity
Taking over the Algona store — formerly a local fixture called Hutsell’s that Brown’s had acquired in 2015 — meant inheriting a crew, a building, and a community that didn’t yet know her. Jozie and Craig are candid that the path to Ames wasn’t handed to her: it was earned by building Algona into a success first.
“The best way to get the next opportunity is to prove yourself completely in the one you already have.”
— Craig Jarrard
Six years after taking over in Algona, Jozie got the call for the long-dreamed-of Ames location, following the previous owner’s retirement — becoming, as Craig describes it, the president of Brown’s Shoe Fit Company, Ames, Iowa, and the actual decision-maker for her own store.
Competing Without Comparing
Brown’s independent owners track each other’s weekly and monthly numbers, and Jozie admits she loves the competition — and hates losing. But she and Craig talk through an important distinction: comparing a 5,500-person town like Algona to a much larger market isn’t a fair fight, and chasing someone else’s number can become a distraction from the better goal of beating your own.
“It’s way more fun to beat yourself — to be a better version of yourself.”
— Jozie Porter
Leaning on the Network
Jozie credits much of her early success in Algona to being able to pick up the phone and call on Brown’s wider network — leaning on colleagues like Ben Dillehay for marketing and advertising help when her own numbers skills needed backup. It’s a message that echoes what earlier guests on the podcast have shared: nobody else can want it for you, but once you’re doing the work, there’s a whole company of people ready to help you do it better.
Fit Night & the Five Senses of Guest Experience
Fit Night began on the newly poured sidewalks of Craig’s Fort Dodge neighborhood back in 2014: a free, no-pressure community walk or run, held every third Thursday from May through October. Jozie built the event for five years in Algona, and she’s now launching it in Ames.
She connects the event to a broader philosophy about guest experience — a store should look beautiful, smell good, and sound right before a customer ever says a word, and every interaction should feel like welcoming someone into your own home rather than just making a sale.
Investing in the Next Generation
Jozie became an owner at 22 and is now, at 28, building a crew drawn largely from Iowa State students who will come and go with each graduating class. She and Craig agree that young people bring energy and a willingness to try things precisely because they haven’t yet learned all the reasons something might not work — and that investing in them now is simply how Brown’s keeps perpetuating itself, one trained-up, trusted owner at a time.
Thinking About Ownership?
Jozie’s story is a reminder that opportunity at Brown’s comes to those who put the work in first — and that the right store, in the right town, has a way of finding the people who’ve already earned it. If a path like hers sounds like the kind of career you’re after, learn more about the Brown’s Shoe Fit ownership opportunity at brownsshoefitco.com or find your nearest Brown’s Shoe Fit location.
Catch the full conversation with Jozie Porter on the With You Every Step podcast, hosted by Adam Smith and Craig Jarrard. #WithYouEveryStep
