Adidas, no one loves it?

Consumers are becoming more rational

Adidas has frequently appeared on hot search recently, and related topics have also aroused heated discussion among netizens. This sportswear giant encountered a lot of trouble 25 years after entering the Chinese market, and its Greater China performance fell for five consecutive quarters.

"Adidas failed to fully understand Chinese consumers. This is a mistake." Adidas CEO Rosde reflected in a recent interview. On August 26, Adidas announced that Luo Side would leave next year and step down as CEO in advance.

The Chinese sports shoes and clothing market is currently in a booming stage. According to public data, the overall market size of my country's sports shoes and clothing in 2021 reached 371.8 billion yuan, and it is expected to reach 599 billion yuan in 2025. However, it was not only Adidas' "falling", and many international brands such as Nike also faced performance dilemma in China. In contrast, domestic sports brands, with the development of the sports industry, the "national tide" has risen, and its performance has gradually increased.

Industry insiders analyzed that the minds of Chinese consumers are changing, and sports clothing is moving from the popularization to professionalism and segmentation. How to better meet the needs of consumers has become a new test.

Figure/Figure insect creativity

The practice of "a routine to the world" is failed

Recently, Adidas announced the second quarter of 2022 financial reports. The financial report showed that Adidas' sales were 5.596 billion euros, an increase of 10.2%year -on -year compared with the same period last year. The net profit was 309 million euros, a year -on -year decrease of 24.2%.

In Greater China, Adidas revenue continued the decline in the first quarter in the second quarter, a year -on -year decrease of 35%. And this is already Adidas' 5 consecutive quarters of revenue in Greater China. Adidas also said that the weakness of Greater China put pressure on the overall revenue of the second quarter and dragged down the overall gross profit margin.

Since the second quarter of 2021, the revenue of Adidas Greater China has fallen by 15.9%, 14.6%, and 24.3%, respectively. In 2021, the overall sales of Greater China declined by 16%. The performance dilemma of Greater China continues to drag Adidas' global performance. Adidas expects the company's operating profit margin this year is about 9.4%, and it is expected to exceed 10%before.

As early as last year, Adidas had realized a problem in the Greater China. Earlier, he also reprimanded the CBA star Hu Mingxuan, but this did not reverse the predicament. In a survey data involved in more than 120,000 people, more than 80%of netizens said that they would no longer buy Adidas products, and only 4%of netizens still purchased Adidas products often.

It is confusing that in 2019, Adidas' performance in Greater China has achieved two -digit double -digit growth in 23 consecutive quarters, and has become the area with the largest sales proportion for the first time. In just two or three years, why did Adidas' market share rapidly declined in the Chinese market?

"We don't know enough about consumers, so we leave room for those Chinese competitors who have done better ..." Adidas CEO Luo Side mentioned in an interview with the media that Adidas made a mistake in China. In the rapidly growing Chinese market, Adidas "falls", the most fundamental reason is the lack of changes.

Cheng Weixiong, an independent analyst in the shoe and clothing industry, told China News Weekly that Adidas encountered the core of "Waterloo" is that it is still dominated by the usual European and American fashion culture and other elements. The practice of the world has failed. In China, this is obviously not accepted by consumers.

At the end of last century, Adidas entered China, not only with global sports superstar resources and halo, but also opened up exploration in the fields of sports fashion. Simith, Yeezy and other segmented fashion brands are popular in the Chinese market. In 2016, the NMD series was officially released. On the first day of the release, global sales exceeded 400,000 pairs of doubles and caused price increases. Many Chinese consumers were very proud if they could have such a pair of shoes.

A sports clothing practitioner pointed out that Adidas has basically been in a state of out of control in the Chinese market in recent years, and has not really studied this market. Previously scarce products, such as "coconut shoes", can now be said to be everywhere. This shows that Adidas is not ideal for its own marketing and channel control.

At present, Adidas Douyin's official account has 8 million fans, but there are only dozens of products in product content, and few comments are comments. Zhang Yi, CEO of Ai Media Consultation, pointed out that before Adidas was sought after by consumers in the Chinese market, it was based on everyone as a fashion. Marketing is deeply popular, and Adidas obviously has not kept up with this trend.

Rise of domestic goods, diverting markets

"Compared with the past, Chinese consumers today like to have a" feeling of China "," Luo Side publicly proposed that Adidas did not find this "Chinese feeling."

In recent years, the emergence of the national tide has performed extremely obvious in the field of sports apparel. With this shareholder style, many domestic sportswear brands have found the right feeling, and they have begun to attack the city frequently and seize the market share of Nike and Adi.

In 2018, Li Ning landed in New York and Paris Fashion Week for the first time. Among the traditional Chinese elements inspired by Zen philosophy, yin and yang, and Chinese landscape paintings, it attracted the attention of many young people in China. A survey data shows that in the past ten years, Chinese consumers' attention to Guo Chao has increased by 528%, far exceeding the attention of foreign brands. In fact, from the perspective of financial report data, the market conditions of domestic sportswear brands are obviously better than traditional international giants. In the first half of this year, Li Ning's revenue reached 12.409 billion yuan, an increase of about 21%year -on -year, and the profit reached 2.189 billion yuan, an increase of 11.57%year -on -year; in the first half of 2022, Anta's revenue increased by 13.8%year -on -year to 25.965 billion yuan. Brands such as Hongxingrke have accelerated their performance.

"The national self -confidence of the Chinese people has improved very quickly. This is a need for insight in the industry. In addition, people who buy sportswear are biased towards high -income people. This part of the population now pursues more comfort for clothing. These domestic brand design design The style is actually more suitable for local people. "The above -mentioned sports apparel practitioners observed that more and more domestic clothing brands are focusing on national tide and other elements. This wave of market dividends is expected to continue for a long time.

"A very critical indicator is 'Ping Effects'. The" Ping Effect "here refers to the proportion of sales expenses that account for gross profit." Senior retail experts Xijiang mentioned. In the first half of 2022, Li Ning's marketing costs were 980 million yuan, gross profit was 6.2 billion yuan, accounting for 15.85%, and Li Ning's marketing costs were 1.78 billion yuan in 2021, with gross profit of 12 billion yuan, accounting for only 14.83%. Xijiang said that this proportion proves that companies have strong control capabilities in retail terminals.

In addition, from the financial report data, Li Ning's overall inventory increased by 11.5%year -on -year in the first half of 2022, the number of inventory weeks was 54.4 days, the number of inventory weeks in 2021 was 54 days, 68 days in 2020, and 78 days in 2019 for 78 days At a better level of the shoe and clothing industry.

In contrast, Adidas is currently in the dilemma of the backlog of inventory. Since 2019, Adidas' inventory has reached 4.85 billion euros, and was subsequently affected by the epidemic. Adidas' performance in Greater China was not ahead. As of the end of the second quarter of 2022, Adidas' brand inventory increased to 5.5 billion euros. This episode reflects the insufficient product power and poor channel control of Adidas.

According to the analysis of Xijiang, after the rise of the national tide, consumers prefer to buy Chinese brands, and domestic brands will naturally divert the share of the previous sports shoes and clothing market. In addition to the advantages of brand image, domestic sportswear brands have begun to practice "retail internal skills".

Zhang Yi believes that the Chinese sports shoes and clothing market is actually a huge incremental market. In recent years, domestic brands have risen sharply. On the one hand, they know more about young consumer groups, especially Li Ning's old age and chasing fashion. On the other hand, they have begun to follow international giants in terms of product layout, design and marketing.

Fundamental changes have taken place in the Chinese market

According to data from the National Bureau of Statistics, from January to June 2022, the total retail sales of social consumer goods were about 21 trillion yuan, a year -on -year decrease of 0.7%; 6.5%. Since the beginning of this year, the clothing industry has continued to be under pressure, but in the field of sports shoes and clothing, the growth rate is still obvious.

Relevant research reports pointed out that the two major areas of sportswear and outdoor products are areas with strong toughness. In the case of gradually recovering the overall optional consumer goods, they will continue to maintain a relatively high prosperity. In the past few years, the market concentration of the sports clothing industry has been increasing. In 2021, China's sports clothing CR5 accounted for 58.1%of the market share, which means that the situation of winners' food -eating will continue to occur.

According to public data, Nike China ’s market share in 2021 increased from 25.2%in 2020 to 25.9%. 14.8%, Li Ning, a single brand ranked fourth with 8.2%. The ranking of the industry header players is changing. Behind this is that the Chinese society and consumer environment are changing, and the needs of consumers are changing.

"Chinese consumers are becoming more rational and will not obey blindly. More and more consumers will choose the products that suits them and meet their needs." Cheng Weixiong said that with the upgrading of consumption, diversified sports demand has skyrocketed, flying disks, land, land, land, and land The niche sports are popular, and the Chinese sports clothing market has developed from popularization to professionalism and segmentation. Domestic sports brands actually stand out from the segmented track. For example, Tuban began to make efforts from running, Anta broke through from temperature, and Li Ning broke from a fashion perspective. But international brands seem to stay in traditional conventional sports scenes, such as basketball, football, etc.

Cheng Weixiong emphasized that in the past three years, under the influence of macro factors such as the epidemic, the Chinese sports shoes and clothing market has undergone fundamental changes. The market has begun to segmented. There are continuous latecomers to meet these needs, and the multi -circle markets are giving birth. Obviously, international brands such as Adidas have not adapted to this change.

Zhang Yi pointed out that foreign sports clothing brands are still mainly offline stores, but in the developed e -commerce markets in China, the superb marketing level, sound logistics system, and perfect after -sales system are indispensable. Trends, scenes and consumption methods are changing. Since this year, Adidas has tried to find some "Chinese feelings" by changing, such as starting to reflect on the proportion of brand advertising and effect advertising, re -examine the brand building of the Chinese market; Olympic champion Su Yiming and football star Zhang Yuning, who sold tens of thousands of pairs of Yeezy. In addition, Adidas also proposed to transfer some product design to China.

"International brands can no longer only consider the needs of global users, but also understand the needs of Chinese users and understand the changes in the business model of the Chinese market." Cheng Weixiong said. Measures, focusing on the Chinese market, may grasp the window period of the Chinese sports apparel market, otherwise, consumers' loyalty will gradually fade. "

Author: Meng Qian ([email protected])

Edit: Li Zhiquan

Operation editor: Wang Lin

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