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They tried almost anything for 15 years.

Reebok was once positioned as a training brand, then primarily as a women's fitness specialist.

Finally, collections by singer and designer Victoria Beckham and sneakers in collaboration with rapper Cardi B should provide a boost.

But it didn't help.

After months of speculation full of half-hearted hints, there is now official confirmation: Europe's largest sporting goods company Adidas is initiating the sale of its US secondary brand Reebok.

When ex-Adidas boss Herbert Hainer bought the US brand in 2006 for an impressive 3.1 billion euros, his main goal was to reduce the gap to world market leader Nike.

The duo of Adidas and the Reebok brand, known in the USA and Great Britain, should make this possible.

It remained a dream for Hainer and the biggest bad investment by Adidas.

Probation period expired

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In the first year after the takeover, Reebok sales fell slightly and Hainer was asked how that could be with so much hope.

Reebok founder and major shareholder Paul Fireman had obviously polished the numbers before the sale.

Reebok never achieved sustained profits that matched the Adidas group and even posted losses at times.

Most recently, it returned to the black in 2018.

2019 should also have been profitable.

On his first day as the new Adidas boss, Kasper Rorsted was asked in autumn 2016 what he was planning to do with the expensive purchase of his predecessor.

The native Dane decided on a probation period to see whether the brand could still make money.

The results were poor.

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Now Rorsted is pulling the cord because he will present his new five-year strategic plan for Adidas on March 10th.

Reebok no longer plays a role in this.

The company has decided to "initiate a formal process aimed at selling Reebok," it says soberly.

4,300 employees in the dark

In financial terms, Reebok will be fully booked in fiscal 2020 and will be reported as a "discontinued operation" from the first quarter.

Adidas and Reebok could exploit their growth potential much better independently of one another, according to the reason.

In the months to come, they will be working flat out to “ensure a successful future for the Reebok brand and the team behind it”.

Reebok has around 4,300 employees, around 3,000 of them in the sales outlets.

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Adidas does not name any potential buyers itself.

A financial investor may strike.

In the Adidas books, Reebok is still with a book value of 803 million euros.

According to experts, that would be the minimum purchase price, so to speak.

The Reebok dilemma for Adidas becomes clear from the fact that the US brand achieved 2.33 billion euros in sales in 2007, the first year after the purchase, with a good ten billion euros in Adidas sales.

So Reebok initially contributed almost a quarter of the total sales of the large German sporting goods company.

In the last financial year 2019, Reebok achieved sales of just 1.75 billion euros, while the group now generates revenues of 23 billion euros.

So Reebok is now smaller than when it was bought 15 years ago.

The loss of the US company, which probably only operates just above zero, will not result in a drop in sales.