Nigel Griffiths, general manager of Nike ACG, is leaving the company to take over as Reebok’s new European chief. He will effectively succeed David Singleton, who announced his departure a few weeks ago. Griffiths held the leading position at Nike ACG for 3 years, after a stint as sales manager for Nike Iberia. His replacement should be announced by Nike ACG before the end of the month. While Singleton was based in England, Griffiths will remain in the Netherlands until Adidas, Reebok’s new owner, takes further decisions on the European set-up for the American brand, but he will likely move in a first stage to Reebok’s European head office in Bolton.
Meanwhile Adidas told investors in the USA last week that Reebok is going to spend this year close to 10 percent of sales on marketing to reverse its downward sales trend, compared with an effective ratio previously estimated at between 5 and 8 percent. It is launching a global campaign around running in the next two months under the “Run Easy” slogan, indicating a lower emphasis on performance than before. A subsequent global campaign, “Best On-Best Off,” will tie up performance and lifestyle, showing top athletes like Allen Iverson wearing different Reebok products on and off the court. A regional campaign featuring its football icons will also run in Europe in the 2nd half of this year.
Adidas’ management appears to be determined to do everything in its power to get the Reebok brand to grow from $3 billion to $5 billion in annual sales within the next 3-5 years. Most of the growth will be in emerging markets like those of Latin America, China, India and Russia. Sales in the USA will again be down this year, but a turnaround is expected for the 2nd half of 2007.
Adidas would also like to see the male/female balance at Reebok shift from 60/40 to 50/50. It will try to do with Reebok’s Classics what it has done with Adidas Originals, reducing the quantity of top-selling models, offering more styles and colors for each one of them and jacking up average prices.
