The German shoemaker said it could add as many as 500 athletes as endorsers.
BY JACOB PALMER | OB DIGITAL NEWS EDITOR
Portland may be a Nike town, but it was Adidas that released the first signature shoe of one of the Rose City’s favorites Tuesday.
The German shoemaker officially unveiled the D Lillard 1 in the company’s American headquarters, which is located in Portland.
From OregonLive.com:
Perhaps Lillard’s most significant nod to his roots was the asking price for the sneaker: $105. In this day and age, a $105 price is among the lowest for an NBA player’s signature shoe – a segment that often is double that price. …
The D Lillard 1 features the new Damian Lillard logo – his initials, “DL,” fusing together to create the letter “0.” The “0” is Lillard’s uniform number, which he chose to represent the letter “O” for the three places he’s called home: Oakland, where he grew up; Ogden, where he attended Weber State University; and now Oregon. On the left side of the logo is a wing made up of three stripes, a nod to the nickname of his group of closest friends and family, the “Fly Guyz.”
Athletes releasing signature Adidas shoes could become more commonplace as the company’s North America President Mark King told Bloomberg TV that Adidas plans on expanding its scope in the United States.
After his appearance on Bloomberg TV, King told Wall Street Journal reporter Sara Germano that Adidas has approval to sign endorsement deals with as many as 250 National Football League players and 250 Major League Baseball players over the next three years, well above the company’s current roster of fewer than 40.
“We need to focus more on the United States consumers and athletics, which is what we’re doing,” King said on Bloomberg TV.
Read more at the Portland Business Journal.
