The primary objective of this portfolio strategy is to ensure that our brands seize market and category opportunities through well-defined and coordinated go-to-market strategies. ...

The primary objective of this portfolio strategy is to ensure that our brands seize market and category opportunities through well-defined and coordinated go-to-market strategies. Each brand is responsible for the execution of its strategic focus by creating a constant stream of innovative and inspiring products and generating communication strategies that represent each brand and category in an engaging and compelling way.

To secure long-term sustainable growth for the Group, Global Brands is focused on driving the development of the adidas and Reebok brands. ...

To secure long-term sustainable growth for the Group, Global Brands is focused on driving the development of the adidas and Reebok brands. The overall strategic goal is to achieve qualitative, sustainable growth by building desirable brands in consumers’ perception. Global Brands played a central role in the creation of Route 2015, the adidas Group’s strategic business plan that was unveiled in 2010. The adidas and Reebok brands are expected to deliver more than 80% of the targeted growth for the Group until 2015.
 
Areas within adidas and Reebok that were identified as key contributors and game changers for the adidas Group include:

• Gaining sales and market share in the key global categories running and basketball with adidas Sport Performance.
• Expanding adidas Sport Style into fast fashion with the adidas NEO label.
• Maintaining adidas Originals’ strong momentum with the fashion driven lifestyle consumer. 
• Establishing Reebok as the leading fitness brand.

The consumer is at the heart of everything we do. ...

The consumer is at the heart of everything we do. This is the first and most important realisation, and we must adhere to it to ensure the long-term success of our brands. As part of its function, Global Brands has mapped out our target consumer universe, which spans from our roots in sport, the “pure performer”, through to today’s style setters who have embraced sporting goods brands as part of their lifestyle. 


To be successful across consumer segments, we acknowledge that a strategy of mass production or mass marketing is no longer sufficient. Only by identifying and understanding consumers’ buying habits, their fitness level, their motivations and goals for doing sport and their individual lifestyle can we create meaningful products, services and experiences that build a lasting impression. In this respect, we have identified five key global trends which will be important to address with our brands and sub-brands over the duration of Route 2015:

– Fit for life: Sport is no longer just about competing and winning. Sport is becoming more embedded in consumers’ everyday lifestyles. Motivations and goals are becoming more holistic, fun, socialising and life-enhancing.

– You are what you know and what you do: Society is embracing a life-long learning attitude, and placing more emphasis on what we know and do versus what we have and where we come from.

– Celebrating individuality: Consumers increasingly fulfil their desire to differentiate themselves from one another by being more creative – on the one hand mixing and matching products and services they need, and on the other hand seeking personalised offerings tailored for them. The growth in social media continues to fuel more and more opportunities to display individuality, making it even more important.

– Together is better: There is an increasing need for meaningful social interaction, both online and offline, as consumers become more mobile, and digital technologies and social networks make it easier for them to connect with like-minded people.

– Back to basics: For everyday life, products and services are desired to be simple and authentic, making consumers’ lives easier. There is a growing interest in outdoor activities and minimalistically designed products, reflecting the desire to reconnect and be in tune with nature.


To match these trends and fulfil consumer demands, Global Brands teams adhere to the following principles:

– Create the unexpected in terms of product and brand experience

– Create the highest emotional connection between our brands and the consumer

– Be prepared for the next generation, anticipating change

– Simplify to the maximum

– Show excellence in execution, being consistent in whatever we do, from idea creation to communication at the point of sale, and in the digital world

We believe that our Group’s multi-brand structure gives us an important competitive advantage. ...

We believe that our Group’s multi-brand structure gives us an important competitive advantage. Through our brand architecture, we seamlessly cover the consumer segments we have defined, catering to more consumer needs, while at the same time keeping clarity of brand message and values. In each case, the positioning of adidas, Reebok and their respective sub-brands is based on their unique DNAs, their history and their values.
 
As a true global brand with German roots, adidas is mainly targeting competitive sports based on innovation and technology with adidas Sport Performance. This sub-brand is the multi-sport specialist. Our positioning in this respect clearly starts in producing the best products to help make athletes better, with a strong focus on football, basketball and running. Furthermore, we seek to leverage brand loyalty and strength in innovation in other categories. The sub-brands, adidas Originals and Sport Style, strive to take the brand’s unique heritage and design leadership to capture further potential in the sports lifestyle and fashion market.


Reebok, in contrast, is an American-inspired global brand with the clear objective to become the world’s leading fitness brand. With Reebok, we aspire to make our consumers “fit for life”. Innovation is rooted in developing products, technologies and programming which enable consumers to live a healthy lifestyle and have fun doing it. Reebok connects with the fitness consumer wherever they are and however they choose to stay fit – whether it’s training, running, walking, dance, yoga or aerobics. In addition, Reebok Classics leverages the brand’s fitness heritage and represents the roots of the brand in the sports lifestyle market.

Each brand and sub-brand is responsible for bringing its own distinct positioning to life, through the creation of products and communications that not only support the commercial functions in their day-to-day business activities, but also provide the platform and framework for long-term market share and profitability improvements. While adidas and Reebok each have unique identities, heritages, technologies, designs and reputations, the strategic principles and methods for driving future sales growth and profitability improvements are common to both. These include:

• Leadership in product innovation to excite and inspire the consumer
• Marketing and communication leadership
• Activation and validation via a relevant set of promotion partnerships
• Extending brand reach and appeal through strategic partnerships

Through Global Brands, we are determined to address every consumer in a specific and unique way – with product initiatives that generate trade and consumer interest. ...

Through Global Brands, we are determined to address every consumer in a specific and unique way – with product initiatives that generate trade and consumer interest. We believe that technological innovation is essential to sustainable leadership in our industry. By leveraging the extensive R&D expertise within the Group, adidas and Reebok continuously challenge the boundaries of functionality and performance. In addition, innovation plays a significant role in differentiating the adidas and Reebok product offerings in the minds of consumers.
 
For example, at adidas, we focus our R&D efforts on advanced cushioning solutions, lightweight and digital sports technologies as well as sustainable product innovation to ensure we continuously improve the consumer’s experience with our products. At Reebok, the innovation focus is on fitness, where the priority is creating products that enhance and improve the consumer’s fitness activities and help them reach – or exceed – their fitness goals.
 
By creating inspiring product and brand experiences, adidas and Reebok strive to enhance their positions as premium brands. This, in turn, is an important catalyst for sustaining and improving the brands’ gross margins, making continuous innovation an important enabler for future profitability improvements. 

To be competitive in the sporting goods industry, brands must have a clear profile towards their target consumer. ...

To be competitive in the sporting goods industry, brands must have a clear profile towards their target consumer. To achieve this, adidas and Reebok are focused on creating inspirational and innovative brand marketing campaigns and developing communication techniques that strengthen their positioning, build brand equity and thus support the achievement of the Group’s commercial goals.
 
A key tenet of our marketing and communication strategy is to harness the emotion of sport and the benefits of a sporting lifestyle across all communication channels. Both adidas and Reebok regularly bring new global marketing concepts to life, which can be easily leveraged to create simple and powerful brand messages and support an array of product offerings.
 
In addition, Global Brands also endeavours to ensure all of its brands are at the forefront of new communication techniques, particularly as the information flow becomes faster and faster. To increase the pace and relevance of our brands’ communication with the consumer, digital marketing now acts as a backbone for all brand marketing activities. Whether through in-store or online customisation platforms, digital social networks, mobile apps or digital broadcast mediums, these methods are providing a new scope of consumer experience in a real-time and cost-efficient way. With consumers spending more time online, the adidas and Reebok digital strategies allow the brands to move from campaign-based communication to developing deeper relationships with their respective target audience. In addition to adding significant value to all our communication efforts, our digital marketing and social interaction with consumers also provide the brands with accessible insights, learnings and measurable results, which in turn can be utilised to drive long-term brand equity.
 
In 2012, adidas celebrated the breadth and depth of the brand across sports, street and style through several brand campaigns. These campaigns focused on increasing engagement with our core audience by leveraging multiple digital platforms, including the launch of the new adidas.com “go all in” platform, providing new levels of access to our products, athletes, celebrities and events. The ClimaCool and Predator Lethal Zones campaigns alone reached over 330 million consumers worldwide. In 2013, adidas will further leverage its brand assets, product initiatives and major sporting events locally, globally and across categories, with the goal of engaging in deeper conversations with its key audience, both online and offline. Innovation messaging is a key priority for the brand in 2013, and it will focus on using innovative ways to continue those deeper conversations, amplifying the product innovations that will be showcased throughout the year while taking the brand experience to the next level.
 
In 2012, Reebok launched one of its largest integrated marketing campaigns in recent years: “The Sport of Fitness Has Arrived”. This multi-touchpoint campaign leveraged traditional media such as TV, print and in-store, but carried an even higher emphasis on digital and social media elements, including a re-launched Reebok.com site, as well as a number of impactful grassroots activities. Through the lens of the fitness movement – CrossFit – Reebok introduced consumers around the world to a new way of approaching fitness, making Reebok’s passion for fitness apparent to all who engaged with the brand. The goal of the campaign was to highlight to consumers the fun, passion and camaraderie that fitness can deliver, showcasing that everything they love about sport can be found in fitness.
 
In 2013, Reebok will speak with a united voice for all its Fitness categories and Classics. The global campaign “Live With Fire” aims to inspire people to join the community of movement and demonstrates the positive impact being fit can have on people’s lives. 

The utilisation of promotion partners such as federations, teams, leagues, events and individuals is an important part of endorsing brand positioning, and an area to which the Group dedicates significant resources. ...

The utilisation of promotion partners such as federations, teams, leagues, events and individuals is an important part of endorsing brand positioning, and an area to which the Group dedicates significant resources. This not only serves as a vehicle to showcase the credentials of adidas and Reebok products in the performance arena, it also facilitates the extension of the adidas and Reebok brands in the sports-inspired lifestyle market.
 
Both adidas and Reebok follow a partnership strategy geared to best reflect their respective positioning in the market. One of the guiding principles of adidas is to equip all athletes to achieve their “impossible”. As such, adidas brings its passion for great products to the biggest stages in the world, with sponsorship agreements for the FIFA World Cup, the NBA, the Boston Marathon, the European Rugby Cup and the upcoming IAAF World Championships in Moscow in 2013. These types of activities generate tremendous visibility for the brand. For example, the 2012 London Olympic Games were an enormous global platform to showcase adidas. As official sponsor, adidas kitted out over 5,000 athletes, 11 National Olympic Committees and 21 national sporting federations. 30% of medals were won by athletes wearing adidas, amongst them gold medallists David Rudisha, Jessica Ennis, Andy Murray and the US women’s gymnastics team. adidas had considerable success leveraging the event with the “Take the Stage” brand campaign, featuring athletes and ambassadors such as Yohan Blake, Laura Trott, Sally Pearson, the Brownlee brothers, Stefanie Graf, David Beckham and Haile Gebrselassie. In addition, adidas has an extensive roster of high-profile sports teams such as Real Madrid, AC Milan, Chelsea FC and FC Bayern Munich in football, the New Zealand All Blacks and France in rugby, American universities such as UCLA and Notre Dame, as well as high-profile individuals such as four-time FIFA World Player of the Year Lionel Messi, basketball stars Derrick Rose and Dwight Howard, marathon legend Haile Gebrselassie, athletic stars Jessica Ennis and Yohan Blake, American football quarterback Robert Griffin III, also known as “RG3” and tennis stars Caroline Wozniacki and Andy Murray.
 
To activate and validate its key concepts, Reebok is partnering with some of the most influential and accomplished people in the fitness industry, as well as with other top athletes from traditional sports. Reebok assets include Reebok CrossFit Games 2012 Champions Rich Froning Jr. and Annie Thorisdottir, as well as renowned yoga instructor Tara Stiles. In 2013, Reebok is also partnering with some of the premier fitness events in the world, such as the Reebok CrossFit Games, the Spartan Race series of obstacle races and the Red Bull X-Alps adventure race. 

adidas and Reebok have both successfully pursued design and co-branding strategies with complementary partners. ...

adidas and Reebok have both successfully pursued design and co-branding strategies with complementary partners. For example, adidas has partnered with Yohji Yamamoto, Stella McCartney and Porsche Design, designing sports-inspired fashion, high-end functional ranges or even luxury sportswear. adidas Originals continues to engage in unique collaborations in fashion, such as with Jeremy Scott, David Beckham and Opening Ceremony, ensuring that adidas remains relevant to the style-conscious consumer.
 
In 2012, Reebok deepened its partnership with CrossFit, which is one of the fastest growing fitness movements in the world. Reebok will focus on making strong connections even further beyond the CrossFit community as the brand moves into 2013. On the Classics side, Reebok and Alicia Keys announced a new and exciting partnership as well as design collaboration. Alicia Keys’ first project was the launch of her own signature Reebok “AK” collection.