Richard Thalheimer

Richard Jay Thalheimer
Born	1948 (age 68–69)
Alma mater	Yale University Hastings Law School
Occupation	lawyer, entrepreneur
Known for	Founder of The Sharper Image
Website	RichardSolo.com

Richard Thalheimer (born 1948) is founder, and former CEO and chairman, of The Sharper Image Corporation.

Richard Thalheimer's family settled in Arkansas before the American Civil War and started a livery business in Little Rock, which decades later became The Blass Department Store, which was for many years the city's largest department store, and remained in business here into the 1970s. Thalheimer was raised in Little Rock. After graduating from Hall High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, he left for New Haven and graduated from Yale University in 1970. He entered San Francisco's University of California, Hastings College of the Law the following year, graduated with a J.D. degree, and was admitted to the California Bar in July 1974.

While still a law student, the 24-year-old Richard Thalheimer started a part-time office supply business in San Francisco, with $500 worth of copier paper. He named his fledgling enterprise "The Sharper Image," in part to help promote the quality of his copy machines.

After graduating from law school in 1974, Thalheimer passed the California bar exam and practiced law in San Francisco for a year. In 1977, Thalheimer discovered a product he believed would sell well in magazine advertisements — a special runner's watch, which was a waterproof digital chronograph. In the summer of 1977, Thalheimer chose legendary ultra-marathoner Walt Stack to be the "poster boy" for the Realtime Watch, which Thalheimer promoted as the first affordable, waterproof, and shock-resistant chronograph that could be reliably used by joggers ("The only chronograph that keeps up with the amazing Walt Stack"). Thalheimer took out an ad in Runner's World Magazine featuring his friend Walt Stack, and sold tens of thousands of the watches at $69 apiece.

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