What's with Adidas and their rebranding?

[brooklyn zoo]

I may sound like a youngin but Im 30 lol.

I'm noticing Adidas is swaying from the equipment line. I grew up wearing the equipment Adidas. Seems like all of their shoes besides the basketball line is limited down to 5 and only 4 players only got a signature shoe line and soccer players and the rest are running shoes while all the other shoes getting the trefoil treatment like the NMD that never existed before the trefoil years and recent EQT that has both logos and the awful attempt they did putting the trefoil on the crazy 8s. Along with College schools singing to UA.

Are you feeling the new/old school look on their products? I mean I believe the NMD should've had the equipment logo instead.

 

[illhistorical]

Interesting observation that I'd like to add to. Sorry about the long reply.

I'm 42 to, so you're a youngin to me.

Back in my day, before the times of social media, the only place for sneakers to be showcased was at televised sporting events, because that's what sneakers were originally intended for, or rap music videos. I'd tune into basketball and, to an extent, tennis, to see the kicks the athletes were playing in. Hence, basketball players like Michael Jordan, Penny Hardaway, Iverson, Kobe, etc., etc. and tennis players like Andre Agassi, Pete Sampras and Michael Chang wore and endorsed the most popular sneakers even though consumers wearing their shoes didn't necessarily play those sports.

NFL and MLB players wore cleats so sneakers were less prominent at those sporting events. Nike in the 90's had a moment with football turf shoes, and Ken Griffey Jr. wore a cleated version of his signature shoe, but otherwise the most marketable sneakers from those two sports were endorsed by two-sport athletes Bo Jackson and Deion Sanders.

"Fashion sneakers" or "casual sneakers" weren't a thing outside of retro sneakers like Converse All Stars or Adidas Superstars or Stan Smith's and the like. Social media changed all that. You didn't have to be a professional athlete or even athletic whatsoever to wear and/or endorse a sneaker. It became more about style and fashion, so why just make new sneakers only for sport? With less emphasis on sport, social media personalities and rappers (guess that's redundant) have taken some of the endorsements that would have gone to basketball players.

Adidas is now just making the distinction. Ultra Boosts, as popular and as fashionable as they are, are meant as a performance shoe, so it gets the performance logo.

NMD's are not. NMD's have Boost for comfort but sorely lack the stability for long distances. NOBODY RUNS IN NMDS. So NMDs, Tubulars, and other retro sneakers get the trefoil. Along those lines you could say nobody runs in Nike Air Max. I've run marathons and do half marathons regularly and I've never seen a Nike Air Max, new or retro, some someones' feet to run those events.

I don't care for Adidas' new branding but people that don't play sports need help knowing what sneakers to buy.

You could Nike has also tried to make a distinction between its performance and "lifestyle" (hate that word) lines by branding their shoes with an LE or LS or Nikelab.