Nike Vs ADI: Silent Battle In China'S Online Market

The competition between Nike and Adidas (hereinafter referred to as ADI) has existed for a long time.

In the past half century, the two sides have been fighting for glue and love in sports costumes, but they did not seem to have won the final championship.

In recent years, the rapid rise of the Chinese market seems to be their new arena, the war spread from the line to the line, the two brands do not give in.

In recent years, ADI and Nike have started a new round of racing speed. One sign is: in February 19th, ADI and Tmall began to cooperate fully and start the new products.

In the same period last year, Nike did the same thing with Tmall.

This means that ADI and Nike are about to launch a new round of traffic contention. Can they win this time?

First, strong competition to compete for the first goal.

1. Cooperate with Tmall successively.

Tmall, as China's largest B2C retail platform, has undoubtedly become the first competition of ADI and Nike.

In fact, ADI and Tmall have been working together for many years. In 2010, its official flagship store entered Tmall, but since 2018, ADI and Tmall have deepened their cooperation.

And in February 19th of this year, announced a comprehensive strategic cooperation with Tmall.

The two sides will conduct in-depth cooperation in new product launches, new retail businesses, consumer operations and new product innovations to enhance brand operation efficiency and consumer experience.

In addition, ADI and Tmall launched the first Tmall super brand day event in February 21st, putting the new UltraBOOST running shoes on Tmall's flagship store in the world in 2019.

At the same time, Adidas said that putting the new products on Tmall's debut will become the strategic focus of the group's new global releases.

In the future, Adidas's three heavy product lines of running shoes, basketball shoes and football shoes will start in Tmall.

And a year ago, Nike also participated in Tmall's super brand day for the first time. It launched the exclusive Nike Air Max Zero "WJK" designed by Wang Junkai, and said that all NIKE new products were sold to Tmall in the global synchronization.

Nike has also worked with Tmall to explore new retail outlets.

Nike and Tmall's two smart stores opened the first time to conduct the digital test of orders and passenger flow. At the same time, Nike's 50 Direct stores also rushed to deliver the order online under double 11 this year.

The preparations for the two sides have been so wonderful that there will be a wonderful competition.

2, the first new product

As early as September 2018, Adidas's exploding white coconut shoes started in Tmall.

Nearly 1.5 hours after the sale, the white coconut shoes were robbed of more than 50 thousand pairs, during which time the stock was in urgent need.

In February 21st of this year, ADI took the lead and launched the new UltraBOOST 19 running shoes in Tmall in the world's flagship store in the world. This is the new generation product of ULTRA BOOST, the most important running shoe series in Adidas running products.

For Adidas, BOOST technology is almost the star product of "turning over": the German brand is going through the hardest time before ULTRA BOOST was launched in 2013.

At the beginning of 2013, the UB series was launched, and Adidas's product competitiveness improved. Almost all the data in the earnings report were red.

The choice is to choose Tmall's global debut and become Tmall's super brand day activities. It also shows Adidas's sincerity and importance to the Chinese market.

In the face of ADI's step by step, Nike will not sit still.

Just a day later, Nike's new Nike Air Max 720 was also launched in Tmall flagship store in the world in 2019.

This new product is also the highest equipped airbag technology in Nike history.

This is the highlight of this year.

The sale of the two new products is only one day apart. I don't know whether it is intentional or unintentional.

3, scramble for celebrity spokesmen for fresh meat

In addition to the start of new products, the competition for fresh meat stars in the Chinese market seems to be in the white hot state.

There are many spokesmen for ADI's Greater China. The three sub series of star spokesmen are different. They include not only the flow of fresh meat such as Lu Han, Yi Lian Qian Xi, Wang Jiaer, but also Yang Mi, Angelababy, Di Ali Gerba and so on.

And this time, ADI and Tmall's first super brand day event, Adidas also took the UltraBOOST's "super spokesperson" - Deng Lun.

In 2018, Deng Lun, an important supplement to Adidas's star endorser matrix, is in line with the needs of its most important product range.

Unlike ADI, Nike, which focuses on sports marketing, has high value athletes, but it does not seem to be a celebrity spokesperson in Greater China.

But in order to reach more young people in the Chinese market, Nike also began to change its concept and join the competition for fresh meat flow.

In early 2017, Nike unexpectedly invited TFBOYS member Wang Junkai to visit his headquarters, causing no controversy.

Subsequently, Wang Junkai's Nike Air Max Zero "WJK", which was designed by herself, was launched and sold on Tmall, but there was no official endorsement, but it maintained a good cooperative relationship.

Dongyu Zhou, who has a good relationship with Nike, is the first Chinese actress to appear in Nike VR video.

In the scramble for fresh meat flow, Nike seems to be a little better than prudent. It takes the lead in forming a star matrix in China and takes the first place.

Two, the score is hard to score.

1, earnings against each other

No matter how the two sides play on the pitch, the final result is the most important.

ADI recently released its 2018 earnings report, which showed that group sales grew 8% to 21 billion 900 million euros (24 billion 767 million US dollars) year-on-year, and net profit rose 19.5% to 1 billion 700 million euros.

23% of the growth in the Greater China region has pushed the overall figure.

As for ADI, the North American market, which has invested heavily in the past four years, is growing by 15% to 4 billion 700 million euros, which accounts for 1/5 of the world.

From the perspective of channel, revenue growth is mainly driven by DTC business with two digit growth rate.

Business.

In 2018, ADI's revenue increased by 36%, more than 2 billion euros.

Nike group's revenue in fiscal 2018 reached $36 billion 397 million, an increase of 6% over the same period last year.

In the 2018 fiscal year of Greater China, the revenue of the Greater China region reached US $5 billion 134 million, increasing by 18% over the same period on the basis of exchange rate unchanged. This is the first time that Nike has broken through 5 billion US dollars in Greater China, and the Greater China region has almost doubled its revenue in only four years.

Judging from the overall revenue of the 2018 fiscal year, Nike took the lead in this game.

But it is worth noting that the growth rate of Nike in the Greater China region is slightly lower than that of ADI.

At the same time, as for the Greater China region is highlighted by these two financial reports, we can see that sales in Greater China has become an important boost for ADI and Nike's growth.

2, Tmall double 11, super product sales data, etc.

Look at the score next.

2018 Tmall double 11 all day turnover is 213 billion 500 million yuan, Nike and Adi respectively occupy the "sports outdoor" sales list top two, the two players are double into the single day business breakthrough 1 billion "one billion yuan club".

It is worth noting that Nike still replaces the "sports outdoor" sales list first, and this round Nike scored one point.

Look at the number of fans in Tmall's flagship store. A year ago, the number of fans of Nike was more than that of ADI. But on the eve of double 11 last year, the number of fans of ADI has been successful.

As of March 14, 2019, ADI's number of fans was 20 million 360 thousand, and the number of fans of Nike was 18 million 510 thousand.

Thus, under the pressure of ADI's step by step, can Nike still defend the arena and defend the double 11 championship of Tmall in 2019?

In addition, last year, Tmall's super brand day X Nike X Wang Junkai's strong combination proved that, even in the pre-sale period, only 30 seconds, the global limit of 5000 pairs of new shoes will be sold out.

5 minutes on the day of the NIKE Tmall super brand day, sales were broken by 10 million.

This year, ADI also launched a Tmall super brand day with Tmall for the first time. In February 21st, it took only 14 minutes to break the sales record of the Tmall super brand.

In this game, the two sides seem to have difficulty in deciding the outcome.

3. Data from other platforms

Apart from Tmall, Jingdong is also an important online game.

The cooperation between Jingdong and Adi dates back to 2014. In March of that year, Adidas opened its official flagship store in Jingdong. Since then, with the strong user base of Jingdong platform and the joint efforts of both sides in marketing and promotion, the official Adidas flagship store has grown rapidly, and its growth has reached 200% by the end of 2017.

In 2017, the ADI official flagship store, which first participated in Jingdong 11.11 promotions, achieved a 923 times year-on-year growth in single day sales.

In the same year, Jingdong jointly held a super brand day, which is the first time that ADI has launched a brand specific event with China's e-commerce platform in China.

Sales on the day of the event made a very good record. The all day sales volume was 11 times of Adidas's 6.18 sales in 2016, and 295 times the daily average sales of Adidas brand. It sold 230 thousand pieces of merchandise, breaking the Adidas's single day sales record in Adidas.

Although Nike did not participate in Jingdong's super brand day just like ADI, the data could not be compared.

But in 2018, Jingdong's 11.11 global good thing Festival, Nike is the most frequent consumer search keyword in the first hour after sale, and consumers' enthusiasm for Nike is obvious.

As of March 14th, the number of fans in the official flagship store of Jingdong has reached 6 million 568 thousand, and the number of Nike's official flagship store fans has reached 4 million 572 thousand, slightly inferior to ADI.

Three, the main stadium has been pferred from offline to online.

How did Adidas and Nike, old friends who love each other kill, suddenly start racing in China's online market?

According to both sides' earnings reports, the Chinese market is one of the two biggest growth markets, and the sharp increase in online channel sales is one of the main reasons.

At the same time, although many business platforms have sprung up in the Chinese market, Tmall is undoubtedly the largest B2C retail platform in China, and its sales volume has reached 2 trillion and 110 billion yuan in 2017, ranking first in China's top 100 retail sales and 43.9% year-on-year in sales volume. This provides a huge online platform and resources for major brands at home and abroad.

As a matter of fact, online consumption plays an important role in people's daily consumption. Sports brands are beginning to pfer the limited number of new sports shoes from offline stores to online shopping platforms.

New products are running out in seconds, 50 thousand pairs a hour, 1 billion a day, and the electronic commerce platform is providing a new round of growth driving force for sports brands.

Adidas CEO Caspar Rosd also said: "10 years ago, the physical store is our most important source of income. Now online shop is our most important store in the world."

"As the leading manufacturer of global running products, we attach great importance to the Chinese market.

In the process, we met an excellent partner, Tmall, which is under the Alibaba group.

We will combine Tmall, the world's most influential e-commerce platform, to create the most perfect and efficient sales platform.

Gao Jiali, managing director of Adidas Greater China (Colin Currie) once said, "this is just a beginning and a milestone. We look forward to more innovations with Tmall, Tmall innovation center and Tmall black box."

It is reported that ADI plans to reduce the number of physical stores in the coming year, and further shift the channel to the online sector, with the target sales of 4 billion euros in 2020.

Nike also won't miss Tmall's platform. They released their fourth quarter earnings in 2018, and held analysts' conference call last year.

It is interesting that in the 80 minute Nike meeting, the word "Tmall" has become a hot topic and has been mentioned 7 times.

Nike CEO Mark Parker said, "Nike has made remarkable achievements in digital pformation, which is mainly due to our learning from the leading e-business platform.

By working with Tmall, Airmax's Tmall super brand day has become a "grand festival of Nike" after Tmall eleven.

At the same time, Nike attributed the excellent results of the Chinese market to the cooperation with Tmall.

According to Mark Parker, Nike group's focus today is three: launching new products, promoting retail outlets and business.

In the "electricity business", Nike emphasizes cooperation with Tmall.

Four, mutual success in the suppression of two giants

According to figures released by a British authoritative consulting company in the world's top ten sports brand list released in 2019, Nike has once again won the top list of international sports brands, followed by ADI.

At the same time, from the 2018 earnings report, Nike's sales are still higher than ADI, but the growth rate of Nike in the Greater China region is slightly lower than that of ADI, so it is not yet clear whether Nike will be able to defend its championship.

Of course, China's annual online shopping crazie double "double 11", the two sides have not relaxed their vigilance.

Tmall double 11 that day, Nike turnover increased 40% over the same period last year, Tmall became the first sports brand.

There is no doubt that following Nike is still ADI.

Although it is still not able to surpass Nike, it seems to be only a matter of time for ADI, which is indeed a "great success".

In the past half a century, the two brands have been "rivalry", and Adi has only begun to show the spirit of winning in recent years.

The two brands have achieved their own brilliance in fighting against each other's bravery. But in the future, whether Nike will stick to the throne or ADI against the wind, everything is unknown.

In addition, there are many excellent brands in the field of global sports. Apart from the two big brothers, Nike and Adi, in recent years, they have been killing many dark horses and threatening. The rapid rise of sports brands including Puma, FIE, China Lining, Anta and so on is also causing the market's attention. But Nike and Adi are also keeping the top two seats for their old friends, which is also a problem they need to think about.