Sharon Price John has had a radical strategy in maintaining Build-A-Bear Workshop’s 28-year-old culture and legacy while forging new directions, responding to customer shifts and marketplace dynamics. Founded in 1997 as a place where young children could make personalized stuffed animals, known in the business as “furry friends,” Price John transformed the American experiential retailer from mall-based physical stores focused on a specific target market into a globally recognized digital brand with experiences beyond four walls. The Build-A-Bear Workshops have expanded to cruise ships, water parks, vending machines, and streaming content, proving that this nostalgic brand could leverage emotional equity into sustainable growth. “Looking ahead, we remain committed to advancing our long-term strategic initiatives, with a particular focus on the global expansion of our partner-operated model,” says Price John. Partner-operated locations include venues like Carnival Cruise Lines, Great Wolf Lodge water parks, Kalahari Resorts, and amusement parks.
Under her leadership, Build-A-Bear Workshop also shattered its child-only demographic ceiling, with teens and adults now driving 40 percent of sales. This strategic pivot has fueled aggressive expansion with 124 net new store locations over two years and strong growth of its digital business.
The company’s digital strategy leverages user-generated content and creative marketing campaigns. The ecommerce platform grew 6.8 percent in the first half of 2025, and the company generates over 10 billion media impressions annually by combining its in-store marketing, social media, and public relations efforts.
Price John recruited executives from multi-billion-dollar companies, deliberately building a team of high-performers positioned for their next career leap. She offered them stretch opportunities that would accelerate both individual growth and the Build-A-Bear Workshop‘s organizational transformation.
Radical Transformation
But business was not looking as optimistic when Price John succeeded founder Maxine Clark 12 years ago. Price John abandoned the conventional turnaround playbook of cost-cutting and consolidation during a time when many physical retailers were retracting their store locations. Instead, she led the brand expanding its addressable market through format innovation, strategic partnerships, and a plan to recruit leadership for the future. When she took over the business in 2013, the company’s revenue was $373 million, and she formed a team with the mindset of scaling the business to a $500 million business.
Price John recruited executives from multi-billion-dollar companies, deliberately building a team of high-performers positioned for their next career leap. She offered them stretch opportunities that would accelerate both individual growth and the Build-A-Bear Workshop‘s organizational transformation. Her advice to emerging leaders is, “Know what you want and be willing to go after it, but also understand that what you think you want today might not be the best outcome for you 30 or 40 years from now. Stay open to evolving.”
The strategy reflects a fundamental principle of her transformational leadership: assembling talent to move the organization where it needs to go, not stay where it has been. “Preserving Build-A-Bear Workshop’s foundational culture while driving profitability required dismantling the false belief that ‘having heart’ meant you couldn’t raise prices or optimize operations,'” explained Price John.
Embedding innovation throughout the organization is the marque of a retail radical. Price John says, “We foster a culture that encourages and rewards sharing new ideas, suggesting fresh approaches, and introducing innovative concepts, provided they’re grounded in real insights and data. In fact, one of our core brand tenets is to stay ‘dialed in,’ which has inspired trendsetting products driven by user-generated content that have become a material part of our business.”
Beyond the Bear
Integral to Price John’s radical vision was systematically expanding its experiential offerings. In 2015, Build-A-Bear Workshop released the Honey Girls collection as part of its first-ever multimedia product line, including plush characters, songs, and an app for creating music videos. In 2021, Honey Girls were the stars of a film produced by Sony Pictures Home Entertainment and Build-A-Bear Entertainment. The award-winning film was well received by young girls: “We wanted to bring story and character arcs to life as sub-brands for Build-A-Bear,” Price John said at this month’s Brandweek Conference.
Under Price John’s leadership, the leadership team also identified a market opportunity from adults who had a deep connection to the Build-A-Bear Workshop brand from their childhood. They captured the nostalgia of childhood memories of the Build-A-Bear experience and the highly acclaimed heart ceremony. They tapped into the emotional connection and personal creativity revealed by their National Teddy Bear Survey, reporting that 92 percent of adults still own their childhood teddy bears, and nearly 100 percent of the respondents said stuffed animals are for all ages, not just kids. Additionally, the participants shared that “despite today’s increasingly tech-focused world, teddy bears remain a source of comfort, connection, and lasting memories – even as we grow older.”
She adds that one of the most exciting things the Build-A-Bear Workshop has done in the past 12 months is “expanding significantly into new countries, now bringing our experience and our mission, to add a little more heart to life, to 32 countries worldwide.”
Radical Leadership
Price John’s radical leadership challenges retail’s binary thinking about growth versus authenticity. While competitors chase digital-only strategies or retreat to their core demographics, Price John has proven that expanding beyond traditional boundaries—from mall stores to cruise ships, from children to collectors—can strengthen rather than dilute brand identity. The company’s record financial performance demonstrates that preserving emotional connections while driving operational excellence isn’t just possible; it’s the blueprint for legacy retail survival. She believes it’s important to be a retail radical by helping to shape the industry: “Build-A-Bear has long been a pioneer in experiential retail. We take that legacy seriously, continually pushing ourselves to reimagine and expand the consumer experience both in stores and beyond.” She adds, “I really hope I can be living proof that you can have fun, lead with integrity, and still be successful. I think we need more data points showing that all three can coexist.”
Build-A-Bear Workshop’s revenue surged to a record $252.6 million in the first half of 2025, marking an 11.5 percent increase as the once-struggling mall retailer completes its transformation into a half-billion-dollar global experience brand. The company’s 17.9 percent return on assets for fiscal 2024 and record profitability demonstrate that Price John has engineered one of retail’s most overlooked turnaround stories. Matthew Cyr, CEO and co-founder of Crave Retail, says, “Sharon shows how a legacy brand can grow when you mix discipline with curiosity. She said recently that the brand was far more stretchable than anyone expected. I love that mindset. It proves that when leaders stay open to what a brand can become, growth shows up in surprising places. That is what makes her a Crave Retail Radical.”
As Build-A-Bear Workshop approaches exceeding $500 million in 2025, its evolution from a single-format mall retailer to a diversified experience brand signals a fundamental shift in how nostalgic brands can monetize multigenerational loyalty. In a retail landscape littered with failed turnarounds, Build-A-Bear Workshop’s success proves that the most radical strategy may be refusing to choose between nostalgia and margins. You can hear more from Price John on our Lead Like Her broadcast.
About the Retail Radicals
The 2025 Crave Retail Radicals Awards include Le Bon Marché, Build-A-Bear Workshops, Pacsun, SKIMS and Sprouts. For the past seven years, we have identified radical thinkers and doers (innovators and entrepreneurial leaders) driving major transformations within their respective retail brands. In a marketplace that is defined by transactions and risk-avoidance, these five retailers have bucked the trend and are helping to transform the industry by rewriting the rules of retail by being bold and brave. Each is a role model for keeping retail relevant and vibrant, and exceeding expectations experientially and financially.
