Top 100 Brands - 1 Adidas

hjh2000tw · 发表于 2005-6-16 10:25:31

1 Adidas: the performance brand

All truly great brands are innovators, and Adidas is no exception. Adolph ‘Adi’ Dassler, the man originally behind the Adidas brand, is widely considered to be the founder of the modern sporting goods industry.

When he was a teenager, growing up in a Germany that had been economic- ally devastated by World War I, he helped his family make house-slippers from left-over military bags. But Dassler’s real love was sport, and particularly soccer, so in 1920 he started making sports shoes. He contacted various doctors, trainers and sports coaches to gain their input, and drew on his own personal athletic experience. From the start, his emphasis was on each shoe’s ‘performance’ for a particular sport, and so he created different types of shoe according to the activity – such as running or tennis or soccer.

This well-researched approach quickly earned him an international reputation. Still in his twenties, he was dubbed the ‘equipment manager of the world’.

Adidas shoes were worn in the Olympics as early as 1928. Athletes loved them. Indeed, athletic performance seemed to improve visibly with the arrival of Adidas. When Jesse Owens dazzled the crowds (and dismayed a furious Hitler) by winning four gold medals in the 1936 Berlin Olympics, he was wearing Adidas running shoes. So was Armin Hary, when he became the first athlete to run the 100-metre sprint in 10 seconds.

Dassler kept Adidas ahead through constant innovation and his determination to design shoes catering for each sport’s demands. Take soccer. Dassler realized that standard soccer boots weren’t sufficient if the pitch was damp. He therefore came up with the idea of studs that could be screwed into the base of each boot, ensuring greater control and accuracy for players. It was with these new boots that the German team sailed to victory in the 1954 World Cup.

As well as soccer studs, Dassler was also the first to come up with spikes in running shoes to enhance the grip as athletes ran around the track.

He also wanted to make sure his shoes were made with the best possible material for their specific use. He conducted thousands of tests on any materials that could provide a possible benefit, including the skin of sharks and even kangaroos. His most successful experiment ended with the creation of nylon shoes.

Dassler wasn’t just a good innovator. He also had a brain for marketing. He knew that if Adidas was going to have completely different shoes for different sports there would have to be an element of unity. In 1949, he therefore came up with the idea of putting three stripes on the side of his shoes so everyone would be able to tell they were Adidas just by looking at them. It wasn’t until 1996, however, that the three stripes became the Adidas corporate logo.

Today, Dassler’s legacy lives on. It still focuses on the sports performance aspect of its products (which now extend to all sportswear). However, it also acknowledges that its market has moved beyond athletes. Indeed, Adidas is now a fashion brand as much as a sports brand. Ever since 1986, when Run DMC’s hip-hop anthem ‘My Adidas’ became a massive worldwide hit, the brand has enjoyed a cool image. Today, Adidas is still embraced by the hip-hop community, with stars like Missy Elliott keeping it high in the fashion stakes.

The challenge for Adidas has been how to balance street credibility with sports performance. Rather than try to combine both together, Adidas has set up different divisions – Sport Performance, Sport Heritage and Sport Style. The Sport Performance division focuses on functionality and innovation, the way Adidas has always done. The Sport Heritage range of Adidas originals with an ‘old-school’ feel showcases the brand’s rich history (these are the ranges loved by the hip-hop community). Adidas Sport Style is aimed directly at the fashion- conscious consumer, and produced with fashion designer Yohji Yamamoto. The Sport Performance division is the bulk of Adidas’s market, representing 70 per cent of overall sales. Sport Heritage is currently at around 25 per cent and Sport Style at 5 per cent.

In terms of marketing, Adidas still concentrates on the major sports events, being an official sponsor of the Soccer World Cup and sponsoring individual sports stars like David Beckham (who is an Adidas ‘spokesperson’ with a $161 million life-long contract) and US basketball star Tim Duncan.

It is also looking for future stars through its various youth sports projects such as Adidas America’s ABCD camp, a basketball skills workshop for top high- school athletes. This camp, which has helped teenagers Shaquille O’Neal and Patrick Ewing become sports icons, perfectly illustrates Adidas’s multifunctional approach to business. Firstly, there is the great PR potential involved with such a project. Then there’s the sponsorship angle. The camp is a key part of Adidas’s strategy to attract top athletes for endorsement deals. It is also the perfect testing ground for new products, as the company can gauge the responses of the future basketball stars.

So this is Adidas: a brand that is looking both forward and back. It is on the lookout for future trends and talent, while never forgetting its own history – even promoting its own history through the Sport Heritage division.

It may now be partly overshadowed by Nike, but Adidas is unlikely to fade away anytime soon. It is a brand that retains credibility, in the worlds of street fashion and sport, by being proud of its past and confident of its future, and by staying innovative. In fact, I’d argue that Adidas benefits from its second-place status. While Nike gets all the criticism for its business practices, the associations of Adidas remain firmly on sports. Also, it is easier to be the number two sports brand than, say, the number two software brand.

Branding, like sport, appeals to our tribal instinct. And the tribalism of branding is never stronger than in the sportswear market. Nike and Adidas are two tribes that depend on each other in the same way as a soccer or a basketball team needs someone to play against. An Adidas sports shoe doesn’t just say ‘Adidas’; it also implicitly says ‘not Nike’, just as a Nike shoe says ‘not Adidas’. Nike and Adidas may hate each other’s guts, but the aggressive competition has ultimately made them both stronger.

The Adidas brand certainly doesn’t seem to be panicked by Nike into making any wrong decisions. Although advertising and sponsorship are a key part of Adidas’s marketing strategy, they have never been at the expense of the products. Staying true to Adolph Dassler’s original intentions, the performance of the products remains as important as the performance of the brand.

Secrets of success

Innovation. Studs for soccer boots; spikes for running shoes; nylon soles: these are just three of the innovations that helped build the Adidas brand.
Performance. As an athlete himself, Adolph Dassler never neglected the performance of his products. He always looked for new ways to improve athletic standards through the use of Adidas equipment.
Competition. Sportswear is as tribal as sport itself. Therefore it will never be a one-brand market. Adidas has stuck to its own gameplan and has thrived in competing with other brands such as Nike and Reebok.
History. Unlike other sports brands, Adidas keeps its history alive through its Sports Heritage division. Far from making the brand seem stuffy and outdated, its ‘old-school’ ranges are considered the most fashionable among the hip-hop community.
Key influences. Hip-hop stars like Run DMC and Missy Elliott, and sports stars such as David Beckham have helped give the brand street and sport credibility.