Asics, the running shoe manufacturer, has started a campaign to raise awareness of its products in Europe. So far, it looks like their plans have been successful. Dow Jones’s Archibald Preuschat has been following the race. Check out the video and the rest of the story after the jump…
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Via Wall Street Journal
Alistair Cameron became a serious runner less than two years ago. But his interest in running is more than just about keeping fit. He says more than half of the participants in the 2011 New York marathon wore running shoes made by Japanese sports-equipment maker Asics Corp., of whose European unit Mr. Cameron heads. While Mr. Cameron recounts this with pride, he admits that “not every one” of the runners taking part in the race realized they were wearing Asics shoes.

“The tiger stripes” of Asics’s logo “are well known as the best running shoes,” says Mr. Cameron. “But not everyone knows they are Asics shoes.” This could change: In this Olympic year, Asics plans a major TV marketing push across Europe, he says.

Asics, the running shoe manufacturer, has started a campaign to raise awareness of its products in Europe. So far, it looks like their plans have been successful. Dow Jones’s Archibald Preuschat has been following the race. Photo: Getty Images

In April 2010, the 51-year-old Englishman became the first non-Japanese head of the sports-equipment-maker’s European operations, based in the Dutch town of Hoofddorp, within jogging distance of Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport.

Now, of Asics’ four regional CEOs, three of them are non-Japanese, marking a serious attempt to bring in outsiders with marketing skills. “What the Japanese do particularly well is making the best product. What Japanese companies haven’t necessarily done well is establishing sales and distribution networks, robust ones, or marketed exceptionally well,” Mr. Cameron says, hence this year’s advertising binge. “I don’t think it’s ever too late,” says the executive, who before joining Asics was the women’s business unit director at shoemaker Clarks International.

More than half of the runners in the 2011 New York City Marathon wore shoes made by Asics Corp. says European CEO Alistair Cameron.

Convinced that a stronger media presence will boost sales as well as brand awareness, he points to Spain as proof. “Spain is one of our fastest-growing markets,” he says. “With the most expensive brand in the market, to be growing in that market is really a sign of how TV advertising supported our strategy.”

Brand awareness of Asics in Spain rose by more than 7% after a TV campaign in March, according to an analysis by Synovate, a market-research firm. The campaign was run a second time in October, but the results weren’t tracked. But given Spain’s hard-hit economy, the Japanese company’s recent performance has been remarkable, posting 32% growth in sales for sports footwear, where the overall market for the product grew by just 1.2%, according to market researcher NPD Sports Tracking Europe, which compared the first six months of 2011, the latest figures available, with the year-earlier period.

“We are forecasting approximately 13% growth for Europe in 2011 in a challenging market,” Mr. Cameron says. “That shows that the advertising we’re doing, the measures we’re taking, are working. For 2012, we are looking for high single-digit growth, so it’s more conservative, but based on the order book we think it’s a prudent budget and our goal is to beat it.”

Asics is much smaller than rivals Nike Inc. of the U.S. or Germany’s Adidas AG. For the fiscal year ended March 2011, Asics had annual sales of about $3.03 billion, up 4.8% from the prior year. In their most recent fiscal years, Nike and Adidas has sales of $20.86 billion and $15.82 billion, respectively. Unlike Nike and Adidas, Asics doesn’t spend very much money on sponsoring athletes in exchange for promotion.

In the nine months to September, Asics’s net sales in Europe were up 13.2% year-on-year. Asics outperformed the overall market for running shoes and performance apparel. European sales for Asics running shoes were up 21% year-on-year and for performance apparel up 25%, compared with rises of 4% and 7.3% for the market overall, according to NPD Sports Tracking Europe market data, which monitors the continent’s five biggest markets: Spain, the U.K., Germany, France and Italy.

Mr. Cameron is even confident that consumers will accept price increases, which he thinks are necessitated by higher labor costs. “If, over the last 18 months, our sales had gone down, then I would say, I’m not sure if consumers can afford to pay €160, [$212] €180, for a pair [of Asics trainers].” But, citing what people spend on smartphones, even in a downturn, Mr. Cameron is convinced consumers will keep spending. “It’s just about priorities,” he says.

The Asics name comes from the first letters of each word in the Latin phrase “anima sana in corpore sano,” which translates as “a healthy soul in a healthy body.” The pronunciation of Asics differs in the U.S.—where the A is stressed—from the rest of the world.

The advertising campaign aims to stress Asics’ credentials as the footwear for serious sports performance, rather than trying to embrace both the serious sports market and the broader lifestyle sector. Its “Made of Sport” media campaign will target sports fanatics rather than casual users of sports goods. “These people spend three times more on sports equipment than anyone else,” Mr. Cameron says.

That doesn’t mean the company ignores the lifestyle market. “We have a lifestyle part in our business, and it’s not an insignificant part,” Mr. Cameron says. But the company intends to hive off lifestyle products to its second brand, Onitsuka Tiger. “By 2013 we will have one lifestyle brand, Onitsuka, and one true sports-performance brand, which is Asics. So there is a huge amount of repositioning,” Mr. Cameron says.