✳️ Merrell inks new Sponsorship & Outside Launches a New Publication
A Trailmix of news and opinions
Hey pals! 👋 The fresh, cold bite of winter morning runs has yielded to a more rainy and dreary transitional period in Cardiff. Despite this sullen state the delusional daffodils think now is the time to show their faces, but they seem to do so earlier every year. Just like the seasons, trail running continues to change with promising new growth in some sectors and ominous change in others. Let’s get to it - Matt
Merrell Continue their Expansion into Trail Running with Skyrunner Sponsorship
What: After four years of sponsoring Skyrunner World Series, Merrell has become the title sponsor of the series.
Bigger picture: For Merrell this comes off the back of a growing focus on trail running after releasing a series of new footwear and more marketing investment. Driven by the broader consumer interest in wearing technical gear in everyday style (“Gorpcore”) and growth in the sport, Merrell see this investment as a way to increase it’s appeal and distribution to bigger markets.
It also helps grow their current hiking-first audience. In an article last year, Sumi Scott, chief merchant officer at Merrell, stated that their expansion into trail running was a good “translation space into hiking” and hence they saw the market size for trail running as bigger than what’s currently being reported.
Even bigger picture: Part of this drive has come from Merrell’s parent company, Wolverine, corporate restructuring following a series of dismal financial results. Last quarter Merrell posted a -24% revenue loss, reflective of the broader outdoors market and their internal struggles.
Matt’s opinion: With trail running sales on the ascendancy across shoe manufacturers, the greater focus on trail running is a smart move, but positioning is Merrell’s greatest weakness.
Merrell historically tied themselves to the barefoot movement with the trail glove, but after multiple iterations and a macro shift in interest into plush foamy shoes, they fell out of favour. If you look across their quiver of footwear today, on paper it’s a good line up from light shoes with Vibram Megagrip and plush bouncy boys for longer pushes, all with vibey colourways, all at a low price point, perfect for those wanting to get into trail running. However, they’ve never been able to shake the ‘outdoors’ company image, not helped by their tendency to largely distribute to outdoors retailers over speciality running retailers. Additionally, whilst I have no data to back this up, every time I visit their site there’s always a sale on, reducing the quality perception of the product.
This greater investment in skyrunning sponsorship could pay dividends for them through increased visibility and credibility in new markets if the Skyrunner World Series continues its upwards trajectory.
(I’ll be following Skyrunning a bit more this season because they’ve shown a lot of promise in recent years. if anyone can introduce me to Skyrunning marketing/media head honchos, would love to write about them!)
Outside Inc. Streamlines Running Content Creation Under New Publication, RUN
What: Outside inc. have launched a new publication RUN and had an internal restructure to streamline their running content production.
The layout: RUN will be the primary location for all running based articles and content created by Outside, from trail running to 5ks, which then will then be syndicated to Trail Runner and Women’s Running. Not all articles about trail running will be reposted on Trail Runner from RUN, only if it is relevant to the publication. According to Zoe Rom, Editor in Chief of Trail Runner, the goal is to drive to and keep people on RUN, but with the option to visit Trail Runner and Women’s Running.
Why change? According to internal data at Outside, most runners don’t identify solely as a ‘trail runner’ or ‘road runner’ but appreciate running as a discipline from multiple perspectives and experiences. For readers, bringing all the content under one roof makes sense. Additionally, from a resource allocation perspective, it allows the teams to pool funds, people, stories, experiences into one venture, rather than spreading themselves across multiple publications.
This is not the only change Outside has brought out recently. Late last year Outside launched a self-serve advertising platform aimed at making the ad buying experience easier for SMEs to advertise across Outside platforms. Targeted display buys across the platform and more broad reach campaigns across Outside TV, their CTV (connected TV) channel, are the only options available so far.
When coupled with the RUN development, the moves suggest the broader strategy is to increase the surface area for ads (another website), and the volume and variety of advertisers, increasing the ways to capitalise on the content created.
Matt’s opinion: If I put my media buyer and analyst hat on, In light of what happened to Outside’s cycling publications after they were acquired and collapsed into a new publication ‘Velo’, It’s easy for this to be seen as another consolidation effort. But thats not necessarily a bad thing.
The new ad platform suggests one possible reason for not folding Trail Runner and Women’s Running could be that by keeping them Outside have more ad space and for larger advertisers guaranteed reach of niche audiences through contextually targeted ads, something that is of big concern now cookies are (slowly) being killed off.
Considering the media market so far this year where publications are collapsing or laying off swathes of writers, it’s an understandable move to want to maximise the return from your content creation.
The uncomfortable truth is that people's media habits have shifted away from reading traditional publications and towards consuming media from a broader range of sources in a variety of formats. The global increase in the number of trail runners, as well as the increasing search demand, indicate that there is a large audience out there, but the percentage of those who are interested in visiting a website for more than service content is minimal. Certainly too small to be supported by advertisements.
At the end of the day, this restructuring is a move to keep the lights on for longer. Which, for the sport of trail running is certainly a good thing. It gives the Outside Run team more room to create the content they want and continue to serve the trail running community that is still reading.
❇️ Everything else
Yes Nike lost its reputation, but more importantly Nike has lost it’s swagger. Great article from BOF laying out Nike’s cultural demise.
Lululemon is continuing it’s steady move into trail running by expanding into men’s footwear. The entrance into footwear via apparel is something Tracksmith have also seen some success in, hence their recent announcement of a ‘super shoe’. The target market for Lululemon is likely the “fashion-forward dabbler of trails, but prefer 5k Park Runs for the post race coffee” kind of crowd, which is likely a much larger market than ultramarathoners. Combine this large audience with the sustained loyalty of Lululemon fans, it’s easier to see this as being a success.
The latest developments in the UTMB/PTRA drama are Catherine Polletti responding in a LinkedIn post that UTMB hasn’t changed and the PTRA having a meeting with the Polleti’s that Camille Herron decided was a good idea to live post - because the relationship between PTRA and UTMB wasn’t fraught enough. One relatively interesting aside in their exchange was that the Polletti’s upped their expected total number of races from previous claims of 50 to 60-70.
Two compelling articles by the legend that is Zoe Rom on the growth of small running apparel and footwear companies and an argument against writing for your fans. “Hot takes might generate likes, clicks, and, yes, fans, but measured, well-reported journalism that ends in additional questions rarely does.”
In a surprise move, Montane will not renew their sponsorship of the Dragon’s Back Race. Will be interesting to see if they renew their Spine sponsorship…
Like the Wind, the running magazine that is on track to become the Surfer’s Journal of running, is celebrating its 10th anniversary with a shindig in London. Would be great to see some of you there to congratulate Julie and Simon’s monumental contribution to running culture.
Any cache or screenshot/recording of Camille's post?
To me, Merrell is pleasantly surprising. They have zero cred in the market yet keep investing. As an industry observer I want as many options in the market as possible, yet as a former business person I know consolidation is real, and I'm not sure this brand can make the cut. And I really hope the new investment in Skyrunning allows them to make a comeback. GTS took over that space, but it's a huge space, and I don't think GTS is planning 50-60 races!