Sports brands are opening flagship stores and attracting more and more customers.
Despite the general trend of reducing sales in the market segment and the flow of customers to online stores and various digital platforms, top sports brands are steadily increasing profits and the number of customers in their monostores. Analysts note that Nike, Puma and Lululemon continue to show positive dynamics against the backdrop of a general negative background in the retail market, where many large players have to massively close stores due to falling traffic.
The California research company Placer.ai found that the number of visits Nike Factory Stores in July and August increased by 38% and 63%, respectively, compared to the traffic recorded in the summer months of 2017. Although Puma still lags far behind the sports market leader in terms of customer numbers, its retail store footprint grew at an equally impressive pace during the reporting period, by 54% and 80%, respectively. In the mono-brand stores of the American brand Lululemon, traffic has increased over the past two years by 40% and 44%, respectively.
Experts note that sportswear and footwear remains one of the most popular trends in the fashion segment. At the same time, the aforementioned brands manage to grow in a difficult environment due to the competent positioning of flagship retail stores. Today it is not only a place of sale, but also a space for engaging customers and increasing their brand loyalty.
Nike, Puma and Lululemon have been actively gaining market share recently. Specifically, Nike, building on the success of its Nike Live store on Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles last year, added another monostore at Long Beach Marina and also opened a long-awaited flagship at the new Nordstrom department store in New York. All this after the triumphant launch of the giant six-story "House of Innovation 000" in 2018.
Puma in August, dared to open its first U.S. flagship store filled with tech and innovation on 5th Avenue in New York just minutes from Nike. And Lululemon last year introduced its customers to its customers. the world's largest store in the Lincoln Park area of Chicago, where a restaurant, meditation rooms and gyms for yoga and intensive interval training were opened on an area of 1850 square meters, in addition to the trading floor. This year it was announced that the brand will develop branded stores in four different formats.