Roxy Rapp is President of Roxy Rapp & Company.
A native of Palo Alto, Roxy was born into the retail business - shoes to be exact. At 14, Roxy was already doing everything from stocking shelves and working the sales floor to helping customers buy the latest in shoe fashions in his father's store on University Avenue. After Menlo College, he opened his first retail store, the Habit (later called Roxy's) in downtown Palo Alto. He later opened a second young women's fashion store in Carmel. At about the same time, in the early 1970s, he founded his own shoe company, the Athletic Shoe Factory, and grew it into a 68-store chain operating throughout the Western United States.
Through his vast experience in retail, Roxy developed a knack for spotting the latest fashion trends, creating incredible curb appeal with his store's window displays, and capturing community interest and buzz with his unusual advertising tactics. In fact, people today still talk about some of his more novel events. One woman told Roxy she remembers the time he dressed up like Uncle Sam and gave her her first $2 bill. Another remembers pleading with her mother not to take her favorite stuffed animal into the store for a Teddy Bear contest Roxy was running. And just about every local teenage girl in the late 1970s remembers waiting in line, along with 1,500 other screaming teens, to get superstar Steve Garvey's autograph at one of Roxy's sports events. And finally, many still reminisce about the Rapp Family Triathlons he held each summer.
In the early 80s, Roxy sold the shoe store chain to Footlocker, a division of Woolworth's, and shifted his focus to high-end commercial property development. Having owned and rebuilt a number of his retail storefronts over the years, Roxy found he had a new passion: development.
Drawing on his retail experience, deep knowledge of the market in the Mid-Peninsula area, and love of historical buildings, Roxy has today personally developed more than 30 projects. From mixed use, retail/office projects and parking structures to high-end office buildings, Roxy has a hands-on, roll-up-your sleeves management style that involves everything from project inception all the way to delivery. He collaborates closely with architects, planners, and building contractors and generally oversees the entire development project until completed, sold, or leased.
Over the years, Roxy has won numerous awards and earned praise from his peers and the public alike. But perhaps most important to his development efforts, Roxy is involved in the community in which he lives. He is a member of the Board of Trustees for Menlo College, and also serves on many civic boards, including the Palo Alto Junior Museum & Zoo, the Palo Alto Chamber of Commerce, and the Palo Alto Trees for El Camino Real committee. Outside of the office, he still finds time to devote to his family (wife Michelle and four kids), friends, and, of course, golf and working out. Marshall Armstrong, a vice president at Liberty Bank in Palo Alto, who has known Roxy for more than 50 years - both personally and professionally -, said it best: "Roxy comes from good stuff!"
