adidas, you're an idiot !

Proudly showing off the Anthem jacket (made by adidas) that I bought in UK  in December 2011.

Should we be pissed off or offended with the rather harsh remark by adidas's CEO, Herbert Hainer? That is after all the support we gave adidas by spending thousands of dollars to acquire the LFC's merchandise. The best part of the excuses given by Hainer is that LFC are not competing in the European championship, so they decided not to prolonged the contract.

The existing contract with the German sportswear giant concludes at the end of this season and after negotiations stalled about extending the partnership last year, Liverpool signed a six year club-record £25 million contract with Boston-based Warrior Sports. The new deal is worth almost double that of the existing Adidas agreement.

Despite other interested parties and this being Warrior's first foray into football, Liverpool were impressed by the company's enthusiasm and their allowance of the club to have a greater input into non kit related merchandise.

Although not largely known outside of America, Warrior Sports became a subsidiary of New Balance in February 2004 and specialises in Ice Hockey and Lacrosse clothing and equipment. The group also recently won the contract to become kit supplier to the Boston Red Sox baseball team, who like Liverpool, are owned by Fenway Sports Group.

The deal marks another impressive commercial performance by the Reds, following amongst others, the record £81.5 million four year shirt sponsorship agreement with London-based bank Standard Chartered, according to vitalfootball.co.uk.

In an interview with the business newswire, Bloomberg News, Hainer was quoted as saying:

"The gap between their performance on the field and what the number should be is not in balance.

"Then we said, 'OK we will not do it'. That's the end of the story. It all depends on the success and the effort and the popularity, the exposure on TV, revenue you can generate by merchandising,'' said Hainer.

This is rather awkward since Standard Chartered Bank has a totally different view on this matter. Instead of looking at the `imbalances', the bank saw `opportunities'. Instead of deciding upon current successes, the bank is looking on the near future successes be it monetary or branding. I supposed adidas, has different business philosophy from the major international business entities. Or is it because adidas was outgunned, outmanoeuvred by another American brand, after losing the North American market to Nike?

If it's so, the Liverpool FC's performance has nothing to do with adidas assessment. Despite not winning a major title for the last 20 years, the fans around the world has never been reduced. Perhaps, some one send adidas the video of LFC's Asia Tour last July. Look closely at Malaysian venue. Do you see any empty section in the stadium that accommodates almost 90,000 fans. 

adidas, you're an idiot.