Diadora presents EQUIPE ATOMO, the first technical performance running shoe made in Italy in the last 30 years. Light and reactive, the Equipe Atomo will be appreciated by runners looking for a responsive and smooth ride to get the most out of every step of their run. It has been developed, engineered, and produced in Italy, the home of Diadora, for almost 75 years. The Equipe Atomo represents the essence of Diadora in its purest form. It unites the brand’s signature premium sport focus with advanced scientific research conducted at its in-house lab.
Diadora has been showing up on the shelves of Foot Locker with their retro-heritage sneakers in a variety of flavors since last year. The Diadora created collabs with the Rocky film series and with long-time endorser Raekwon. The heritage inspired models have been hit or miss, with certain models being reduced in price to 49.99 in some instances. The reintroduction to a brand is always a complex process. Companies looking to hit the sneaker consumer follow the same trajectory, a blend of storytelling combined with influencer marketing. When it works you get Champion’s successful rollout from three years ago. When it doesn’t work you get Champion’s overproduction and fall off three years ago. For a better reference think about how hot the Fila Disrupt was in 2016 and 2017 and how today, new models like the Centa and Renno are not as popular as they should be in the U.S.
The U.S. is a game of “who wants to get a share of what Nike leaves behind.” There isn’t any way to offset this as Nike controls almost every aspect of sneaker culture. The recent success of a brand like Brooks happened when the company completely abandoned lifestyle and heritage footwear and they focused on performance. Performance running is a segment where the consumer isn’t really interested in fashion. That consumer wants the best feeling trainer, and they go through kicks almost every 3-6 months. The problem with Diadora utilizing a beautifully designed running shoe is buyers at retail are focused on mimicking what worked with Nike as opposed to introducing the consumer to new shoes that work. In other words, the Diadora N9000 and its comparison in age and style to the Air Max 90, gives buyers an easy item to justify, even when it fails at retail. A performance running shoe would occupy a small competitive area in Foot Locker or Finish Line, and the young sales leads, who probably don’t run and can’t explain the benefits of a performance shoe, wouldn’t be able to sell the Atomo.
The Equipe Atomo was introduced last year. The company recently introduced a pair designed with Olympian and the first Italian to win gold in the Oympic and Boston Marathon, Gelindo Bordin. There is a discussion on heritage and performance available in the Equipe. In the retro release of Diadora, there are only forced connections to popular culture and ‘cool’ colors looking to engage the consumer. The result is a page full of promotional items and other items waiting to be reduced. You can only tell the story of a color, or influencer once, you can always talk about the performance aspects of footwear. You can sell features much longer thank fashion when your brand name isn’t Nike, Jordan or Yeezy.