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After every basketball season wraps up, Randy Nills, president of Nills Brothers Sporting Goods in Kansas City, thinks about getting out of the basketball shoe category. And he's certainly not [...]

FOR THE AVERAGE CONSUMER, a walk through a Costco store is like a treasure hunt. There is the Ab Rocket and Flex Master Deluxe kit (As Seen On TV!) for [...]

With the popping of the housing bubble quickly wreaking havoc across Wall Street and the global economy, the active sports lifestyle market suddenly faces its biggest challenge since the Great [...]

While the sports licensing category has moved from an urban-driven to a fan-driven business, that doesn't mean fashion is totally out of the picture. Although hard-core fans continue to demand [...]

Whether consumers or retailers are ready for it, the cross-training category is about to attempt a rebirth. The revival, which is now being heralded by major marketing campaigns touting Under [...]

Despite the tightening of budgets, demand for more customization in team uniforms hasn't let up. Indeed, with parents increasingly footing the bill for uniforms and warm-ups, coaches are letting players [...]

In its biggest overhaul since changing its name from 'Modell's Shoppers World' in the late 1980s to focus solely on sporting goods, Modell's Sporting Goods has launched a comprehensive reinvention [...]

Tough times call for prudent inventory management at retail. But is the industry overdoing it? As retailers work to keep inventories lean this year and focus on bottom-line profitability instead [...]

Sales reps have traditionally been vital in bringing new brands and ideas to the sporting goods marketplace, but their role in recent years has changed as a result of sporting [...]

While Under Armour certainly holds the potential to become a big player in the running footwear category, the compression apparel king faces almost marathon-like challenges around its spring 2009 entry. [...]

Customer service appears to be making a comeback. As in most retail sectors, the general trend in footwear has been toward self-service, as witnessed by the rapid expansion over the [...]

The Finish Line has proven that sneakers can be sold without markdowns, but it took nearly 20 years to do it. The chain started in the early '80s as a [...]

It's not just Nike launch product and retro jerseys. Some Wall Street critics quibble that The Finish Line's sterling results over the last few years are largely a result of [...]

The 2004 retro lineup includes minor league jerseys of baseball legends, college jerseys of current baseball stars, and apparel collections from retired NBA team names. That's in addition to the [...]

A frequently-cited marketing maxim holds that women drive 80 percent of consumer purchases at retail. While finding the original source of that figure has proven to be elusive, most will [...]

With greater clarity finally arriving in the eleventh hour from federal authorities, the sporting goods industry seems to have been spared the full brunt of new child safety laws centered [...]

Already under pressure across the country for years, school budgets face another test with the deepening of the current recession and its impact on the tax base for many communities. [...]

With an eye toward getting out in front of and understanding the recession's short- and long-term impact on the team sports industry, SGD TEAM Business asked athletic directors across the [...]

Few retailers have been busier experimenting at retail than Nike, Inc. Since announcing plans to significantly expand its retail business in February 2007, Nike has launched two new concepts with [...]

Since becoming CEO of Foot Locker Inc., in 2001, Matt Serra has long pushed to establish one of the most highly disciplined organizations at retail. But with the faltering economy, [...]

While many retail observers are forecasting the worst holiday selling season in 17 years, a funny thing is happening at the mall. Athletic specialty appears poised for a rebound. Inventories [...]

Like many other athletic segments, action sports is showing its age. Coming off of huge gains in the '90s--thanks in large measure to its appeal as a fringe, underground culture--action [...]

This past March, Asics Corp. named Nobuo Oda as the new chairman and CEO of Asics America. He comes to the U.S. with more than 40 years of experience within [...]

Joseph Bentvelzen, founder of Shoes-n-Feet, certainly knows all about fixing aching feet, but his initial training came from fixing broken shoes. In 1932, his father, Jan, opened a shoe repair [...]

Once an afterthought in the sports licensing game, tailgating has mushroomed into a sizeable opportunity for sporting goods retailers. The growth has certainly been enhanced by the dramatic increase in [...]

Within two years of forming Skechers with the launch of its first line of logger boots for men, Sketchers took its successful Sport Utility Boot to kids' and women's sizes. [...]

Kids Sportsworld, which operates two stores in the St. Louis area, is the only children's full-line sporting goods retailer in America. The business was established in 1992 by owner and [...]

Running a children's store takes a lot of patience. Not only is it necessary to keep temperamental kids entertained, but dealing with often equally temperamental parents is part of the [...]

Russell Athletic, one of the oldest brands in the sporting goods industry, is all about reaching the youth market these days. In its product and marketing, the company is redefining [...]

While customer retention programs are getting all the hype these days, the bigger battle often involves keeping sales associates on the payroll. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] According to the U.S. Bureau of [...]

With countless energy bars now on the shelves of grocery and convenience stores, the healthy snacking trend has reached mass acceptance. But the athletic consumer is also finding an ever-widening [...]

With countless energy bars now on the shelves of grocery and convenience stores, the healthy snacking trend has reached mass acceptance. But the athletic consumer is also finding an ever-widening [...]

The 'marts' keep getting bigger, better and more brutal in taking share in many categories, the latest being groceries. But so far, sporting goods retailers have avoided taking any major [...]

While R & D teams continue to wow consumers with the latest and greatest breakthroughs, often the technical aspects are difficult to grasp. Just as basketball sneakers have grown up [...]

While vendors dealt with their own 'pink it and shrink it' issues when addressing the women's market, sporting goods retailers also faced challenges. The most obvious changes many retailers have [...]

Long a retail mainstay in the Pacific Northwest, G.I. Joe's has found a new groove since its management buyout in 1998. The Wilsonville, OR-based chain, now under the direction of [...]

People often turn to the outdoors to kick back and relax, but many outdoor retail store owners are starting figurative forest fires in the outdoor and sporting goods space. [ILLUSTRATION [...]

In 1989, two brothers, Bert and John Jacobs, started hawking T-shirts on the streets of Boston, eventually quitting their substitute teaching jobs to take a five-year jaunt through college towns [...]

While the sporting goods industry continues to undergo a merger frenzy, the dark side of the business is rarely mentioned. The truth is, many mergers fail. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] For the [...]

Carlo Lingiardi calls himself a 'turnaround specialist' and he believes he has his hands full as the new president of Teva. 'It's a great brand that definitely needs rejuvenation and [...]

While early wintry weather is always a big driver for a successful Holiday retail season, fuel prices are also weighing on the minds of sporting goods merchants this year. But [...]

The questions outnumber the answers right now as the industry analyzes the repercussions of Adidas buying Reebok. Among the major issues are: How can the Adidas/Reebok combo position each brand [...]

To go or not to go? That has increasingly become the question for many buyers when it comes to trade shows. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The mammoth trade shows of yore have [...]

With retro jerseys soooo last year, the sports licensing market appears to be in a rut. According to The Licensing Letter, overall sales of licensed sports apparel fell 6 percent [...]

For independent reps, the squeeze is on. With every retailer or vendor merger in the sporting goods industry, it seems to get a little tougher for the independent rep to [...]

In a constant battle against sales staff ennui, sporting goods execs have long wondered how best to motivate employees on the selling floor. Store management seems to be taking a [...]

While Athleta is a catalog operation that specializes in women's fitness apparel, Lululemon is a retailer focused on yoga clothing. Both believe they have figured out a problem that has [...]

Customer loyalty programs are creeping into the sporting goods industry. Also called frequent-shopper programs, loyalty programs began in the highly competitive airline industry. In fact, American Airlines was the first, [...]

What's the solution to the nation's obesity epidemic? To answer this, SGB polled some industry experts who offer their views here on the future of fitness and exercise. As expected, [...]

Robots won't be zooming around retail floors any time soon, but it might seem that way. A tidal wave of technological innovations are coming down the pike to improve store [...]