Why Do Sports Brands Need To Expand Their Stores?

In August 10th, after a period of trial operation, Fujian's first JORDAN flagship store, JORDAN 99 HUBINDONG, officially opened in the Mixc, the core business district of Xiamen.

Since 2017, the JORDAN brand has accelerated the pace of opening independent flagship stores in Greater China. There are only 1 opening businesses in 2015 and 2016, 5 in 2017 and 2018, and 4 in 2019 just after 2/3. On the day of the opening of the flagship store in Xiamen, Dong Wei, vice president of Nike global and general manager of Greater China, told a lazy bear sports interview: "the future flagship store of JORDAN brand will also have a series of subsidence and expansion in Greater China".

In the past, apart from Nike's official website, JORDAN brand products rarely authorized the sale of offline dealers, and the independent JORDAN flagship store was much smaller in the Greater China region. Moreover, JORDAN brand products are usually "embedded" in some large Nike franchised stores in one area for sale. In this way, the shop display space is extremely limited, and dealers have different choices for ordering JORDAN brand products. Therefore, consumers often complain that the JORDAN products in physical stores are "incomplete in goods" and "incomplete in code", which, to a certain extent, affect the consumer experience of the store.

In recent years, the new retail trend is changing the value of sports brand stores. Korean retail specialist Lu tetcher divides the development of the retail market into three periods: the period of commodity sovereignty, the period of channel sovereignty and the period of consumer sovereignty. The value of retail in these three periods is also different.

The period of commodity sovereignty occurs in the era of commodity shortage. In this period, the value of retail is to purchase goods, so long as they can be organized into commodities, retail is valuable.

In the period of channel sovereignty, the value of retail is to occupy the market and open more stores. Whose stores are large and the market coverage is wide, whose channel is valuable.

In the period of consumer sovereignty, the quantity of commodities is huge and the species are abundant, and the market competition is highly intense.

Obviously, at present, the retail market has entered the period of consumer sovereignty, and the richness of the same kind of goods in the sports equipment market has surpassed any historical stage. The value of a store is not only selling goods, but gradually becoming an important traffic entrance. It also needs to establish a social center for brand users. This puts forward new requirements for major sports brands.

In recent years, international and domestic sports brands such as Nike, Adidas, Skech, Anta and other international brands have opened large scale retail outlets such as brand centers, concept stores and intelligent stores in the crossroads of big cities or large commercial streets.

"Landing on the street can play a better role in displaying large glass, and a large area of independent shops also provide space for sports brand products and facilities, and effectively enhance customer experience." RET Rui Yide, a commercial real estate consultancy, pointed out in a sporting goods retail research report.

As the parent company of JORDAN brand, Nike opened its first self flagship store in Wangfujing pedestrian street in Beijing in 2007. Its shop is 4 stories high, with an area of about 1200 square meters. At that time, it was the largest in the nearly 3000 Nike brand stores in China, showing Nike's entire line of products. Over the next decade, Nike flagship store, marked by its concise "Swoosh" logo, has been opened in the core business areas of major cities across the country. These large Nike flagship stores will open a specific area in the basketball area of the store as a display area for JORDAN brand products.

Adidas has also opened many large retail outlets known as "brand centers" in Beijing, Shanghai, Hangzhou and Chongqing. According to public information, Adidas's brand center shop has a minimum area of more than 2000 square meters, reaching a maximum of nearly 5000 square meters. Shops include almost all products of Adidas, including football, basketball, running, training, outdoor, clover and all kinds of joint funds.

Skech is currently promoting the whole category of "super stores" in the whole country, but the cities that they choose to choose are in the two or three tier cities in the country, such as Shenyang, Qingdao, Jinhua and so on. Skech China CEO Chen Weili has said that in the next two years, there will be at least 300 super stores with a single store area of not less than 1000 square meters in China.

Domestic brands, such as Anta's "nine generation shop", are coming down this year. In addition to the store size and overall product quality, the Anta nine generation store is equipped with self-service cash register system, cloud storage rack and VIP area video interactive system.

In the fierce market competition environment, JORDAN brand began to launch a large-scale upgrading plan for its retail stores, and accelerating the layout of flagship stores is the top priority.

After breaking away from the previous "embedded" mode, the store of JORDAN flagship store is now more likely to be selected for pedestrian shops rather than traditional shopping centers. On the one hand, street shops are usually able to meet the greater demand of the JORDAN brand flagship store for the shop area, so as to create a new landmark for a city or a business district. On the other hand, when the JORDAN limited shoe sales are available, the street space outside the shop can accommodate more queuing Sneakerheads. The "shoe race" robbing shoes and the AJ shoes that are constantly being fired are the best advertisements for JORDAN brand.

Take the Xiamen flagship store, which is newly opened by JORDAN brand, for example, the store is located in the core business district of the city, and the huge JORDAN brand logo is printed on the exterior wall of the shop. The walls, staircases, fitting rooms and other places of the shop are printed with the famous motto, portrait and other personal elements of Michael Jordan, the "basketball God". There is also a "shoe wall" on the first floor and the two story. All the sneakers from the 1 generation to the 30 generation are collected from the AIR JORDAN series.

In terms of product display, consumers can see the latest JORDAN brand shoe and clothing equipment at the first quarter of the season, with a "flying order station" on the right side, which can be customized for consumers' T-shirts and shoes of Xiamen's urban elements. The two level is a more comprehensive display of the JORDAN brand's full range of products, including basketball, training, sports life, children and JORDAN brand and the French giants Paris Saint Germain's latest joint products, in addition to a mini basketball court, for consumers to play a simple practical experience of sneakers.

In today's competition between e-commerce and physical retailing, the major sports brands are still willing to afford expensive rents. The main focus of the construction of large flagship stores in the core area of the city itself may not be sales, but to establish brand image and spread more brand culture to consumers.

"Under the current new retail environment, whether it is Nike or JORDAN flagship store, it has played the role of linking our brand and consumers." Dong Wei said, "the most direct purpose of the Consumer Direct Offense strategy that we have been implementing over the years is to narrow the distance between us and consumers."

According to Nike group's 2019 earnings report, JORDAN brand's global revenue reached US $3 billion 138 million, excluding exchange rate factors, which increased by 12% compared to the same period last year, ranking second in seven categories (running, Nike basketball, soccer, JORDAN brand, training, sports life and others).

Over the past 4 years, the JORDAN brand has also maintained a high growth in the Greater China region, and the JORDAN brand's revenue growth in the Greater China region has increased year by year in seven categories: from fourth in fiscal year 2016 to second in the 2019 fiscal year. Su Junming, general manager of JORDAN brand Greater China, also said in an interview: "JORDAN brand has achieved double-digit growth in Greater China in fiscal year 2019, and has become one of the core growth points of Nike in Greater China. Greater China is also the fastest growing region of JORDAN brand in the world.

In this period of consumer sovereignty, for many sports brands, the transformation from providing "products" to providing "lifestyle" is the goal of their next transformation.