Nike is the number one footwear company in the industry, but its sales are down compared to last year. According to report by Deutsche Bank analyst Dave Weiner, the sportswear giant saw an overall drop of 9.7% while its competitors, adidas and Under Armour, saw double-digit gains.
In the basketball sneaker category, Nike's sales dropped 13.7% compared to last year. Despite the drop in sales, Nike is still doing extremely well with basketball sneaker sales. The Air Jordan V "Alternate '90" was the best selling basketball sneaker in the week of January 30.
Under Armour led with an impressive 70.5% increase in sneaker sales as the brand continues to gain momentum with Stephen Curry's signature sneaker. Even with a large increase in sales, Nike athlete LeBron James is selling "10 times more sneakers" than Stephen Curry.
Adidas finished the year with a 24.2% increase in sales and even Skechers had a 3.8% increase.
Named The Best Sneaker of 2015, the adidas Ultra Boost dominated the running sneaker category, despite overall running sneaker sales dropping 5.3% in the last year.
“In the past, Nike has dominated the running category with its Roshe and Free platforms,” Weiner added. “So Adidas’ recent encroachment is noteworthy.”
By no means is Nike doing poorly – other companies are simply starting to close in on areas they otherwise dominated. It'll be interesting to see what Nike does in 2016 to try to increase sales, while its competitors continue to try to get a bigger piece of the pie.
