Kobe retired in 2016 and signed a five-year contract with Nike. According to estimates by BMO Capital Markets, the economic benefits brought by this contract to Nike amounted to $250 million. The contract expired on April 13, 2021, but Nike and Kobe's widow Vanessa Bryant failed to complete the renewal.
According to Matt Powell, an industry analyst at the market research firm NPD Group, the Kobe series has received more attention in the Chinese market in recent years than in the US market. “Nike will not lose much if the contract is not renewed.”
According to Baller Shoes DB statistics, in the 2019-20 season, more than 100 NBA players used Kobe's signature shoes, which are the most popular signature shoe series in the NBA. And after Kobe's unfortunate death, more and more players are willing to wear Kobe's signature shoes to express their memory. According to The Undefeated's statistics, when the 22 NBA teams went to the Disney closed park for the rematch, 102 players used Kobe's signature shoes. Kobe's 5th generation is the most popular.
This is why when the news of Kobe's signature shoes "discontinued confession" came out, many NBA players began to stock up on shoes. If Nike can complete the contract renewal, Kobe's signature shoes can still allow Nike to gain a lot of exposure in the NBA arena. But if this series can't continue, maybe after a few seasons, Kobe's signature shoes will be "extinct" on the court.
According to the data released by the NPD Group in February 2020, the sales of basketball shoes in the sports shoe market accounted for less than 4%, a sharp drop from 13% in 2014. In addition, the sales of functional basketball shoes dropped by nearly 13% compared with the same period in 2019, which is also the fourth consecutive year of decline. Judging from this set of data, basketball shoes are not easy to sell, and actual combat shoes are even harder to sell.
In this regard, UBS Group analyst Jay Saul believes that the shift in consumer fashion tastes is part of the reason for the decline in basketball shoe sales. "5-10 years ago, everyone liked to wear wide pants. Cool. But now everyone prefers the design of narrow trousers, and it’s a bit weird to pair it with bulky basketball shoes."
In recent years, the popular sports and leisure style has indeed caused a considerable impact on the basketball shoe market. The high-top and bulky basketball shoes seem to have to stay on the court and cannot adapt to other application scenarios.
This trend is also forcing sports brands to make changes. Puma, which only returned to the basketball shoe market two years ago, began to exert its strength and launched a batch of low-top sneakers that took the retro route, and the color combination was more diverse, trying to break through the limitations of the actual basketball shoe use scene; Adidas is more radical, The signature shoes of its stars James Harden, Donovan Mitchell, and Trey Young are all low-top, and use pink, orange, purple and other colors rarely seen on previous basketball shoes, which are very eye-catching.
Nowadays, a best-selling basketball shoe needs not only good performance in actual combat, but also good-looking enough to adapt to multiple usage scenarios, and is no longer limited to the court. In recent years, domestic brands have also spent a lot of attention on the color matching of basketball shoes. This is not only eye-catching but also for a shoe to have more stories to tell.
The problem that basketball shoes don't sell well can be solved by Nike, and the same goes for other sports brands. As Powell said: "Consumers are the real helmsman of the trend. They will make the brand what they want."
