Warriors star Steph Curry is incredible at many things, but selling shoes does not appear to be a strong point yet. Under Armour, who signed Curry in 2013 and recently extended his contract through 2024, confessed the poor sales of Curry’s flagship “Curry 3” shoe on Thursday. CEO Kevin Plank admitted the bad news in a conference call:
“Our success in basketball hasn’t been without its learning. As we launched the Curry 3 late last year, our expectations continued to run high. And while the 3 played very well on court for Stephen Curry and our athletes, a sluggish signature market and a warm consumer reception led to softer-than-expected results. This has created an inventory imbalance that we are working through. One that, yes, is baked into our full-year outlook which hasn’t changed and, most importantly, yielded lessons we’re applying ahead with the Curry 4 and beyond.”
Under Armour did not expect such a sharp decline in sales, especially with Curry being such an enormous name. The poor reception from the public didn’t help. Plank mentioned this as a lesson learned for the inevitable “Curry 4” shoe. He says that Under Armour will be sharper with future shoe launches “with respect to number of color offerings, scarcity, exclusivity and cadence of launches to drive more consistent engagement and results.”
Under Armour has quite the arsenal of signed talent. Aside from Curry they also have golfer Jordan Spieth, who at the time was on top of the world of golf. 2016 was a difficult year for the sporting goods brand, however. They posted their first quarterly loss as a public company and in November announced they lost $600 million of value due to poor sales.
Steph Curry has had four different shoes come out since he signed in 2013, and recently unveiled a playoff edition dubbed the “Curry 3Zero”. The first shoe from Curry debuted at $120, but the subsequent models progressively grew more expensive. The price of the “Curry 3” has been slashed by many stores in order to move old inventory, but the “3Zero” went back to $120. Under Armour sees the value in having a dominating shoe line and seems committed to figuring out the overall process. I am no business man, but allowing shoes to progressively get more expensive is a questionable methodology.
