A great business/sports apparel story yesterday from the Baltimore Business Journal on Under Armour’s recent run at Nike and the sports apparel industry as a whole.
From the article: “The 2,822 miles separating Baltimore from Beaverton, Ore., barely illustrates the distance between Nike’s full-year sales of $18 billion and Under Armour’s $607 million. Still, as Under Armour’s first serious line of sneakers hit retail stores May 3, there is a growing vibe across sports that if any competitor has a shot at eroding Nike’s 40 percent — and growing — domestic athletic footwear market share, it’s not Adidas . . ., but Under Armour.”
The article keenly points out that Under Armour is serious about competing in the sports apparel market for both on- and off-field activities: “Under Armour introduced cleated footwear two years ago, quickly grabbing more than 20 percent of that market, taking share from Nike, Reebok and Adidas. However, as Tom Shine, senior vice president of global sports marketing at Reebok, has been saying for years, ‘I never saw a kid in cleats hanging out in the mall.’”
The big test, then, will be whether teens, as well as high school and college athletes, will embrace Under Armour off the field the way they have on the field . . .
Tags: Adidas, athletic apparel, high school athletes, Nike, PrepChamps, Reebok, teen consumers, Under Armour
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