The Success Of Lululemon And GAP Shows That Leisure Sports Are Normal.

In 2008, the next year of Lululemon's successful IPO, Cape group (

Inc.) bought a less famous dress brand, Rasleta, for $150 million.

10 years later, Rasleta is already one of the important growth engines of the Cape group, and its sales are expected to reach US $1 billion in the next few years.

In 2017, the smaller brands of the Cape group brand had set a $919 million sales volume, an increase of 18% compared with 776 million in 2016, including Rasleta, InTerix, a contemporary price retailer, and the brand Evidington Vay, which has just closed down recently, with the bridesmaid skirt as its main brand.

Rasleta has contributed considerably to this sales volume.

While continuing to shut down Gap stores that were not performing well, the company built Athleta stores steadily, and opened 16 new stores in 2017 alone.

In the past 10 years, this is the earliest directory.

The brand that started in 1998 has begun to rise with the emphasis on health and fitness lifestyle.

The global health industry, including sports fitness, spa tourism and alternative medicine, was worth more than 3 trillion and 700 billion dollars in 2015 and 3 trillion and 400 billion dollars two years ago.

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While expanding the physical retail business, Athleta is also committed to providing more products and styles. It extends the customer group from the 35 to 55 years old and the majority of the women living in the suburbs (the majority of the brand audience) to a wider range.

"Our audience is actually very small and relatively narrow," explains Nancy Green, President and chief executive officer of Athleta, who supervised and launched the sub brand Athleta Girl in 2016: "we still focus on those customers living in the suburbs, but the customer group (age range) is slowly expanding towards both ends."

In this way, the brand did not make any strange moves.

But the saying that "the wind of leisure sports is dead" has been a frequent headline in the past year, and Athleta continues to be successful. It seems quite surprising.

This phenomenon is partly due to the rebound of the global tannin clothing market worth $92 billion 900 million. In 2017, the global tannin clothing market grew by about 4%, the first leap in three years.

But in 2016,

Mark Parker, CEO, once said surprisingly, "tight pants are contemporary jeans".

But there is no evidence to support this sentence.

Now, the growth of sports fitness clothing market is not as explosive as it used to be.

Statistics from Euromonitor International show that since 2012, the global sportswear market, which includes high-performance sports wear, outdoor clothing and sports inspired costumes, has increased by 5.6% annually and over 180 billion US dollars in 2017.

The market is expected to reach US $215 billion by 2022, but the compound growth rate has slowed down significantly, to 3.4%.

Although the growth rate has slowed down, sportswear is still better than the fashion market.

However, the growth rate of China's clothing market is still higher than the overall growth rate of the global apparel market. The global apparel market is expected to have a compound growth rate of only 1.9% (US $1 trillion and 500 billion) in the next five years.

"Clothing consumption in the US market is generally sluggish, and we can see that the consumption of sportswear and non sports wear is slowing down, or so in the fashion market," said Matt Powell, a sports industry analyst at NPD group. "Although the slowdown has slowed down, the performance of sportswear is still better than that in the fashion market."

For this market, most of the remaining opportunities come from the "sports inspired" clothing category, which is commonly referred to as "casual sports style" (Athleisure). This general term is also used to describe consumers wearing such clothing.

In the US market, sportswear designed with high performance sportswear, which uses the same fabric as traditional sports fitness clothes, is not limited to sports activities. The growth rate of sportswear will exceed any other subcategory in the next five years, and the sales volume will exceed US $31 billion by 2022.

Brands like Athleta are most glinting in the fashion area inspired by fitness.

This brand, like its biggest competitor, Lululemon, is also known for its high quality tight trousers.

Lululemon has also had a series of public relations events that have continued to grow, but some consumers feel that their main products are not "evolving and upgrading" in time.

But unlike Lululemon, Athleta successfully broke the fashion market with "Sculptek jeans".

Athleta's elastic jeans, which were listed last autumn, are made of a commonly used brand of classic sportswear, and are now one of the ten most popular products of the brand.

Athleta said that the popularity of Sculptek jeans is also because the brand has fulfilled its promise, that is, offering products that look like jeans and have tight pants.

"Now that we have technology support, we are thinking about how to achieve real added value," says Green of Athleta. "For consumers, it must be meaningful."

It is not just sportswear brands that try to exploit business opportunities with technology.

Traditional fashion clothes

It is also rapidly adding high performance sportswear or products inspired by sportswear.

Retail technology company Edited data show that over the past three years, among the 38 retailers at different prices from Forever 21 to Match Fashion, the number of products in this category has increased by 236% (from 8002 to 26897).

New market participants with clearer product priorities may become the biggest winners.

Although Outdoor Voices is still the biggest concern in the field of sportswear, it has raised $57 million 500 thousand in the hands of famous investors such as Mickey Drexler and A.P.C., and Canada's RYU and Australia's The Upside have opened niche markets with fashionable and highly skilled products.

The two brands have recently opened retail stores in New York.

For example, RYU is able to stand out with its accessories. The brand sells the minimalist gym bags and shoulder bags with the matching sports wear and casual wear.

"No one wears clothes just for dressing," said Marcello Leone, chief executive of the brand. "Today's trend is to combine sport with street fashion and lifestyle."

The Upside is targeting luxury consumers, known for their dialogues and inspiration from the profile of the show.

"Girls who wear our clothes will be fashion lovers," said David Bush, chief executive of the brand, explaining that there are two main ways of thinking about products: fitness and relaxation.

"We pay more attention to lifestyle rather than black tights.

What we mainly do is clothes that people can wear when they go to the gym and come out from the gym. "

These small new brands are still some distance away from growth.

But for consumers, the key to product clarity may be their competitive edge.

Nowadays, consumers are pursuing "special". They want to buy products that meet the needs of precision.

"By 2018, small and beautiful is the real thing," Powell said.

"There are opportunities, but they must have a good product to be trusted."