When Joe Foster founded Reebok with his brother Jeff in 1958, it was a small running shoe company with moderately sized ambitions: tackle the athletics market and break into the U.S.
By the time Foster retired from Reebok in 1989, the brand had scaled to dizzying heights. Mick Jagger had worn Reebok Freestyles in his Dancing in the Street music video with David Bowie, Jane Fonda had adopted them for aerobics, Cybill Shepherd had donned a bright orange pair at the Emmys, and Foster was rubbing elbows with the likes of Sean Connery and Frank Sinatra in Monte Carlo.
Reebok had overtaken Nike as the number one athletics brand in the mid-’80s, and in 1989 was still making more than the sportswear giant annually, with $1.82 billion in sales compared to Nike’s $1.71 billion. It was a wild success story that saw Reebok’s sales spike from $12.8 million in 1983 to $310 million in 1985, and well over one billion in 1987
“Reebok kind of has the unfortunate case of: They’re always being viewed through the lens of their competitors,” Nicholas Smith, author of “Kicks: The Great American Story of Sneakers,” said in an interview. In the ’80s and ’90s, that meant the battle between Reebok and Nike. In the 2000s, it meant Reebok was seen as a subsidiary of Adidas. “There were very few chances where they really got to stand and show what they are as a brand on their own.”
It’s not just a story of Reebok’s plateauing growth and eventual decline. It’s also a story of Nike’s incredible rise. By 1997, less than ten years after Nike and Reebok were neck and neck, Nike had grown to $9.2 billion in net sales, while Reebok was stuck at a slower pace, raking in $3.64 billion. It wasn’t an insignificant amount of money: In fact, Reebok made only slightly less than Adidas that same year. But Nike had already begun to pull ahead, and it hasn’t given up its lead since.
Reebok becoming number one “kind of caught Nike completely off guard. Afterwards, Nike regrouped, they found a very well-known, at the time, basketball player named Michael Jordan. And we all know the rest of that story — how they were able just to capitalize on Jordan stardom and leap way past Reebok, leaving them behind practically forever,” Smith said. “But, you know, if you grew up in the ’80s like I did, you kind of remember just what a thing those Reebok shoes were
Reebok’s scrappy journey to number one took everyone by surprise, Nike especially. Its decline has been much slower, as falling sales and an owner that didn’t invest in its growth took their toll. Over the years, Reebok was reduced to a fraction of what it once was. The brand holds just 1.1% market share in the sports footwear space (a rank of 16th), according to Euromonitor International. Apparel is even worse: Reebok holds just 0.3% share, a 12th place ranking.
#SNSInstitutions #SNSDesignThinkers #DesignThinking
Retail Store Manager at Reebok
1mo🔥🤘