Under Armour’s steady growth has been the subject of interest by industry analysts, and the fact that the fascinating Kevin Plank is so eager to let his thoughts be known to the public and be generally more “accessible” than the CEOs of his competitors have resulted in some interesting headlines. Today is no different; according to a recent interview with Bloomberg Television, Plank calls adidas their “dumbest competitor” and reiterates his dislike for that brand as well as “the other guys”, who are likely Nike. Check out the full video interview with Plank on Bloomberg Television.
RUHLE: Then re you getting out of your old category is my question. Because Nike and Adidas is who you are focused on, and we just heard from the Adidias CEO they could sign between five and 500 athletes.
PLANK: Yes.
RUHLE: What are you going to do, just chase one another to pay more money?
PLANK: Spending more money is no strategy, right? And we’re not going to compete with our dumbest competitor either.
RUHLE: Is that what Adidas is?
PLANK: They will chase the old — they will chase the old model. And we’ve got good competitors in our space, but we also see some things that are a bit irrational from the way we see. So chasing and bidding someone up is not the goal. The race to the bottom is not the goal that we have. So that we think that in order to spend our money you will still see us go after the right assets, the appropriate assets. And we’ll spend to get those assets. But you’ll also see us take a different approach, which we think this is. This is a different voice, a different communication, a different handshake with the Under Armour consumer.
RUHLE: But is Adidas your dumbest competitor?
PLANK: Specifically, I don’t when mind you quoting me. I didn’t say it. But I don’t like them. No, I like them. I don’t like the other guys either but that’s my job.