Chapter 7: Business Marketing

Since Umbro’s change of ownership in 1999, the company has had to rethink its marketing strategy. As well as pioneering latest technologies in products, the time was right for using other technologies to target youthful people in a way that would meet their specific needs more closely. This process is known as segmentation, a process in which the marketplace is divided into smaller segments consisting of buyers with similar needs or characteristics.
Market segmentation enables an organisation to tailor products and strategies to different sectors of the market and just like a rifle, to hit the target market with precision. Using the world-wide-web has become a way of life for youthful people as they are able to search for new games, information sources, entertainment, and leisure activities.
The user is also able to make return visits by use of the web addresses. Internet users with an interest in football and who may want to buy an Umbro kit are different from high street buyers. UMBRO.COM represented a good opportunity to use a different medium with new

possibilities such as web casting, interviews and reports to develop a unique relationship with youthfully minded football enthusiasts.
As football (read: soccer) continues to shine brightly, Umbro's shadow continues to grow. Umbro makes and markets football products including uniforms (kits), equipment, and footwear, as well as casualwear. Harold Humphreys opened a workshop in Wilmslow, Cheshire, in 1920. In 1924 Umbro (a contraction of Humphreys Brothers) was founded. The company has manufactured uniforms for about 150 football teams, including Brazil's national team, which wore Umbro at several World Cups. It also produces uniforms for England's national team. Umbro's parent company, athletic-shoe-and-apparel-giant NIKE, has agreed to sell the company to Iconix Brand Group for $225 million.


Umbro continued to build its brand around its soccer heritage, promoting the game around the world in an effort to make Umbro synonymous with the game. During the World Cup year of 2006 the company launched a global marketing campaign based on the "One Love" theme. At the same time, Umbro looked to extend its brand appeal beyond soccer to cutting-edge fashion, hiring British fashion designer Kim Jones to reinterpret soccer fashion. In the United States in 2006 Umbro signed a 15-year licensing agreement with Dick's Sporting Goods, a move that was hoped would spur shopping mall sales. Overall, Umbro appeared to be well positioned as a soccer-focused sporting goods company. How long it would remain majority-owned by Doughty Hanson remained to be seen, however.