– Adidas Brand Logo –
My favorite athletic brands are adidas, nike, and under armour. I will probably do a blog about each of the three eventually, but I will just be focusing on adidas for now.
1. Describe the brand logo (design) in detail and why you believe the company selected the brand elements (color, size, layout, character, etc.) that they did. Your analysis should include a brief description of the competitors and how your selected brand logo compares. In other words, why did they choose the brand elements that they did?
{ Scroll to bottom to see logo }
Adidas’ logo is three lines. Three stripes. Whatever you want to call it, that is literally all it is. However, the most common symbol of their logo is three black diagonal stripes that form the shape of a triangle – a mountain shape. (The mountain is supposed to symbolize strength and agility with their product.) While black is their most typical logo color, it can be found in any color under the rainbow. Their products reflect that too. The letters of “adidas” are written in a sans serif font, making the logo look clean cut.
I would say that adidas’ main competitors are nike and under armour – consequently my other two favorite athletic brands. All three of them generally are displayed in black and white, but all three use any color on the color wheel. I would say that these three really compete with each other in pretty much all categories. They are all in the same price ranges, they all target the category of sportswear, they all are worldwide brands, and many other such similarities. However, I think that Nike was first in the US market and just hit it off better because they are by far the biggest sportswear company. Adidas only gets half the sales that Nike does, and Under Armour only gets a fifth of Adidas’ sales. So I would say that the success of each of these brands just boils down to customer’s brand loyalty and the brand’s key influencers.
2. Describe the target market (ie. what segments are being targeted)? How do you know this is the target market? Did the company make good decisions to reach the target market?
Adidas targets people that are active physically or people passionate about sports. This would mainly be younger people ages 20 to 30. They are now focusing on enlarging their main-focus target market to include 14 to 19 year olds. Brands often even target specific sports more than others, and adidas is often associated as a soccer brand. However, they have been expanding more and more recently. I am on the Volleyball team here at North Central and I know that Volleyball’s brand name used to be Mizuno, but over the past few years, it has fluctuated more between Nike and Adidas. So I know that Adidas is putting themselves out there to more sports now.
3. Does it work? Why or why not? Any general observations?
Adidas is amazing. I love practically all of their products. However, I can say that about Nike too. So I am not sure whether it works or not. If I don’t compare adidas to Nike’s sales, yes, I would definitely say it works! But if I do compare to Nike’s sky-high sales, I have to question whether Adidas is doing it right or not. Nevertheless, I do think Adidas has grown immensely as a company over the past ten or so years just from my own observation being involved in sports for about ten years. I feel like Adidas was not nearly as big of a brand when I first started getting involved athletically.
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