Why is adidas becoming super unpopular in many market segments of today's sneaker world?
Well, I think in running market, which was one of their core markets, Adidas has made many crucial mistakes:
Slept in the laurels of Boost for far too long, other manufacturers developed similar or even better foams while Adidas was cashing in on Boost forever.
Overused Boost, from mall-walking kicks to marathon racers, it was 5 years of “pure boost” madness. Did not effectively make differentiation of products in the line: SolarBoost, PureBoost, UltraBoost, Ultraboost are crazy expensive for such an old tech and are hardly sell out until they all go 60 percent off sell. Another big mistake they've made in Running segment is that totally forgot about fast runners, focused on comfort-oriented runners (the most runners nowadays) until they finally came up with Adizero Pro line shoes in 2021.
They released their new Lightstrike foam that seems to be amazing but SL20.3, Boston 12 and Adizero Adios 8 are almost identical on paper. Only very experienced reviewers have been able to figure out the difference. They also come in at similar prices and are not related as a product line but completely separated.
Their Adios Pro line shoes seem to be very successful now, but most normal casual runners cannot justify the crazy high price of these shoes. The Prime X series shoes are even more expensive. So most average runners shun adidas lineup altogether now.
They have been struggling in lifestyle market too. Nothing they make sell out till marked down significantly like 50 percent off.
Even their collabs drop only on Confirmed are not popular. And many people know that all their shoes eventually go sell, so no need shoe raffle app for them or even forking out the full retail price for any of their shoes.
Even the Yeezy line is now dead. They even go sell very often.
I think the most recent thing that might have negative consequences in their lifestyle line is changing the business model for Kanye’s Yeezy. While at Nike, the brand was always considered extremely premium and limited. They only released about 5000 of each color and they sold out immediately. So, Nike never needed to discount Yeezy or even most Jordans or Vomero 5's. Kanye’s vision was to make “fashionable but affordable shoes” for all and that is why he started working with Adidas instead. They released them in larger quantities, and they took much longer to sell. The brand completely changed its strategy and Yeezy is no longer a “feel special” brand. With the appeal of a normal Adidas shoe, but price twice of that "Normal Adidas" shoes, and in this year 2023, they damaged the brand image of Yeezy even further by treating Kanye West like a war criminal anti-semantic person. That really hurt the Yeezy brand. Now I am not sure how long the Yeezy brand can or will survive.
Another big issue in their lifestyle shoes business is that none of their Y2K era shoes are considered to be really cool or iconic, nowhere near the popularity of the rival brand shoes from that era. And now Y2K is the trend in shoe market.
NB has been enjoying massive success of their super-dad shoes like the 1906R, the 90/60, the 2002R, the 610 trail and the 860v2. Nike also has some successful Y2K shoes like the iconic Vomero 5 and the Pegasus P 6000.
Asics has similarly flashy Y2K runners like the Kayano 14, the gel Nimbus 9, etc.
Hoka also has some nice comfortable super dad shoes like the Clifton 1 and 2. And they are now super popular!
Even Puma has some nice Y2K era shoes like the RSX, the RS-Fast and the Velophasis.
Adidas actually has some nice silhouettes from that era, but they are completely shunned by the hyperbeasts that really hurting them. I think their Hyperturf, Response CL and Supernova cushion 7 are quite cool, but none of those super shallow narrow minded hyperbeasts online seem to know them.
Now, everything seems to be going against them in fashion market except the new neo classic retro trend. I think their Samba and Campus seem to be doing a bit better now than the rest of their shoes, still nowhere near the popularity of the trendiest hyped Nike or NB shoes, though.
Adidas should realize that Boost thing is dead, Ultraboost is now considered to be an embarrassing old man shoe.
Yeezy are no longer considered to be cool!
So, they must move on from those once upon a time cool but now dead kind of shoes.
Then, what can they sell instead?
I think the neoclassic line of their shoes are becoming trendy now as many Paris based big brands used them for their collections.
So, some fashion minded people buy them, and many normal people follow that move. However, I doubt that those sneaker influencers and actual sneaker people will follow the neoclassic trend as most of the neoclassic shoes like the Samba OG, the Stan Smith, the gazelle, the Campus 80, etc. are all super uncomfortable.
So, they need something similar to the NB 1906R or the Nike Vomero 5, or the ACG Lowcate low, or reinvent a new more modern version of Ozweego 3 (from 1998).
