Lose Control, Gain Love

Long gone are the days when a company or brand could tightly control their image and reputation through their own carefully orchestrated advertising campaigns. Over the last years and with the establishment of social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter or YouTube, many marketing professionals and brand managers out there had to learn that what they say about their brand is not nearly as powerful as what people say about it. Consumers are in command.

They not only discuss, like or dislike and spread brand content, they also create it. Many brands have learned to come to terms with that whilst a few managed to even leverage and successfully celebrate ‘open-source branding’. Now adidas is taking ‘open source’ to the next level giving consumers also much more influence when it comes to product creation. With a movement away from standardisation and into customisation, the vision is to create the ultimate personalised product for every consumer. And we have just made the first step.

In Ansbach, a small town about 45 minutes away from the adidas Group HQ in Herzogenaurach, adidas is setting up a pilot Speedfactory production facility – featuring revolutionary automated production concepts that do not only offer high-performance quality to consumers, but also render unique design to the product. And already in the first half of 2016, the first concept shoes comprising 500 pairs of running footwear are all set to hit the ground.

With the new Speedfactory in Ansbach as a pilot, the plan is to step by step set up similar facilities across different locations and get all of them closely connected. This would enable an information exchange between the different Speedfactories in terms of different components such as production, trends, product availability, etc. So, at the end of the day, we can drive personalisation and customisation as close to perfection as possible.