Can CR7 brand match the legacy of the Air Jordan brand

Revaulx

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I’m an old git so don’t care :)

PS what is Air Jordan? Sounds like a Middle Eastern airline to me…
 

Stacks

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Also culture comes into it too. Air Jordans are highly sort after by global "trend setting communities" in the USA and this then spreads to other countries like UK and China. I got mates in my community who wear Jordan's and don't know a darn thing about basketball but because certain famous African Americans wear them they follow. Some of my mates are buying and selling Yeezys now too
 

UnrelatedPsuedo

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No. CR7 is shite as a name for starters.

I’m sure he could have a stand alone brand that people bought into. But it would only be by the weird people that celebrate brands.

Ronaldo is a weird dude. He’s not the guy that’s going to carry a brand into cultural significance. He’ll never break out of the mindless consumer market. Will still make dickloads of cash but he’s never going to be an icon.
 

gica_7

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It is almost impossible for any other sports brand to match the legacy and heritage of Jordan brand. Jordan had Ronaldo's fame in a world that did not have social media or the internet. And if we see all these people roaming in streets with sneakers, it is mainly because Jordan made sports shoes cool. He turned them into a fashion item. Having Tinker Hatfield, one of the best shoe designers of all time also helped for his brand.

It's an unfair competition for any athlete.
 

Tom Cato

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Air Jordan brand with 'Jumpman' was one the biggest stroke of marketing genius from MJ and the nike team. 30 years on, it's still one of most sought after shoes in the world

Can the CR7 create an everlasting brand like MJ. 30 years on, will folks be wearing CR7 kicks? Speaking of which, wonder why Nike isn't positioning it more around Ronaldo's trademark Siiii stance?
I don't believe so, for a few reasons:

Air Jordans: The home market of Michael Jordan. He is for all purposes still a living god in America for anyone who follows sport. He's part of US sport folklore with Babe Ruth, Muhammad Ali, Jackie Robinson and Jesse Owens. Internationally he's only towered by Muhammad Ali. The first Air Jordans were launched in 1985 by Nike. Several editions of the Air Jordan are frequently named as the most iconic sneakers from the 1980s, and it's never really lost steam since. Today the old sneakers are incredibly valuable collectors items. Altho initially, Air Jordans were not very popular, they were as unpopular as being a clearing rack item before the Jumpman rebranding.

The advantage Jordan has is that Air Jordans were one of the first true global superstar brands way before everyone had their own brand. And he had Nike help build it.

CR7 competes in an age where global consumption is at a crazy high, where big brands are in their thousands and famous athletes have athletic apparel lines you've never even heard of. I am certain that a CR7 sneaker could do well. But it needs to become iconic in order to compete with Air Jordans. And Nike's branding problem is that he's an all time great, but unlike MJ, he's not the defining player of his sport. He's one of a handfull of all time greats.

Plus, he's not American. We have a more fickle approach to fandom here than in the US where sport stars have cult followings by the hundreds of thousands, and the immortalization through various media outlets is substantial.

That's also the advantage MJ have with Jumpman. The shot of Michael Jordan jumping for that logo is one of the most recognisable logos on the planet. They had time to build the brand and name recognition in relative peace before the internet boom. Everyone who follows sport knows that logo. And if they don't, they will look at the logo and think of the one player eveyone has heard of because he's the best: Michael Jordan. The CR7 celebration stance, and I've actually had a look since I was curious, just doesn't have that factor. It's not immediately recognizable what's going on to a untrained eye. Granted: this is my opinion, I'm frequently wrong, and right about a lot of things when it comes to my own profession.

Its of course entirely possible that Nike tries to make a new superbrand of sneakers with CR7. If Ronaldo goes on to win the Premier League and the Champions League with Manchester United, as someone who works in athletic and outdoor, I'd be on the phone to my freighters in China booking all the shipping containers I can for the following year.

I just think that, in terms of iconic - It just feels like there are too many big names with too many brands that we can really have another Air Jordan brand. The only way it can happen is if social media makes it so, and that is a massive ask.

Edit: It's also very dependent on market and assosciation. Football is not that big in the US so a sneaker brand connected to a football player will have a minimal impact there, whereas it could be huge in Asia, and pretty-ok in local markets in Europe. A few years ago I had a customer relationship with Under Armour introduced the Muhammad Ali Collection in Norway thinking it was a no brainer. It fell completely flat. Its one of those times where I've assumed that name recognition would do the job for me, but as it turns out, you also need relevance to the name and item in the local market.
 
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Chief123

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No. CR7 is shite as a name for starters.

I’m sure he could have a stand alone brand that people bought into. But it would only be by the weird people that celebrate brands.

Ronaldo is a weird dude. He’s not the guy that’s going to carry a brand into cultural significance. He’ll never break out of the mindless consumer market. Will still make dickloads of cash but he’s never going to be an icon.
Yeah don’t really feel the CR7 as a brand. It just feels like half a postcode from Croydon.
 

Lay

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Nah, basketball is cooler than football.
 

TsuWave

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No. Never.

Air Jordan is too big and is a cultural staple.

CR7 will never even touch Yeezys let alone Jordan.
 

jem

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I agree with other posters that nothing can quite match Jordan.

When you hear 'Jordans' now it makes you think of sneakers, not Michael Jordan himself - the brand has become more than the man.
I wouldn't go that far, but yes when used in the plural ('Jordans'), the shoes do spring to mind.
 

FujiVice

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Not a chance in hell. The Air Jordan brand is bigger than the man himself, and Jordan is pretty fecking big.
 

saivet

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Practically it doesn't make sense. MJ played in Air Jordans and wearing those kind of trainers looks fine in a casual setting. You don't wear football boots unless out on grass or 3g pitches therefore near impossible to replicate that kind of impact.

Maybe it's cause I'm older and don't give a feck about football boots but the biggest I have seen was when Beckham wore predators and maybe Ronaldinho with Tiempos.
 

Kaush949

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No. CR7 is shite as a name for starters.

I’m sure he could have a stand alone brand that people bought into. But it would only be by the weird people that celebrate brands.

Ronaldo is a weird dude. He’s not the guy that’s going to carry a brand into cultural significance. He’ll never break out of the mindless consumer market. Will still make dickloads of cash but he’s never going to be an icon.
Agreed, CR7s sounds lame. But I think, 'Cristianos' could possibly work well. There is potential to rebrand and he has 300M followers. But, doubt Nike cares.
 

Sayros

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Can't say I've ever seen anybody outside of Cristiano Ronaldo wear CR7 branded clothing out on the streets, ever. It's pretty incredible how successful Air Jordan has been pretty much 20 years on after Michael retired. It's one of those things that feels is ever-lasting, while CR7 I don't see it even making a blip once he's retired, but maybe he surprises everybody and actually devotes a ton of effort to make really good apparel and products, but I just don't see him ever coming close to what brand Jordan has done, no way.
 

Rado_N

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Every single Jordan shoe release gets sold out in seconds and appears on dead stock site for several times the retail value, and the man retired 20 years ago.

Ronaldo had a limited edition Air Max 97 that did ok I think, and runs to the high hundreds on StockX but there’s absolutely zero chance of his brand ever reaching even 1% of that of Air Jordan.
 

georgipep

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The biggest reason why it won't happen is because the Jordans are shoes that you can actually wear every day and be seen with them. They are a status symbol. Ronaldo plays football and the professional shoes can't be worn casually in the real world. It just doesn't work. And if they just make sneakers, they won't have the same weight because Ronaldo doesn't play in them.
 

TheLord

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Absolutely NOT. And this comparison is ludicrous, to be honest!
This thread can be closed.
 

Sara125

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People pay thousands of dollars for retro Jordans off resellers with the chance that they may not even be authentic. As marketable as Ronaldo is, there is no way in hell his brand can ever have that power
 

RUCK4444

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The biggest reason why it won't happen is because the Jordans are shoes that you can actually wear every day and be seen with them. They are a status symbol. Ronaldo plays football and the professional shoes can't be worn casually in the real world. It just doesn't work. And if they just make sneakers, they won't have the same weight because Ronaldo doesn't play in them.
I'll be honest, and this is just my opinion of course, I think every pair of Jordan's I've seen are hideous. I love my trainers, but Jordan's are just pure fugly to me. Big shapeless, clunky things. Each to their own but I find them very difficult to class as something I could easily wear daily unlike many other trainers.

I'm obviously in the minority or they wouldn't be so popular, but I've just never understood the appeal to the actual look of the shoe itself. The Jordan brand however is super cool, the Jumpman logo has been around for a long time, so naturally is very difficult to CR7's brand to over take that.
 

Sara125

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Also, like others said, I have never watched an NBA match from start to finish in my life yet I can’t count the amount of Jordan’s I’ve owned in my lifetime. You won’t find many people who aren’t into football with CR7 merch. Maybe Portuguese people.
 

AFC NimbleThumb

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I wonder if on some LA Lakers forum someone has started a thread asking if/when the CR7 brand will get as big as the Jordan Brand. . .

This place :lol:
 

georgipep

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I'll be honest, and this is just my opinion of course, I think every pair of Jordan's I've seen are hideous. I love my trainers, but Jordan's are just pure fugly to me. Big shapeless, clunky things. Each to their own but I find them very difficult to class as something I could easily wear daily unlike many other trainers.

I'm obviously in the minority or they wouldn't be so popular, but I've just never understood the appeal to the actual look of the shoe itself. The Jordan brand however is super cool, the Jumpman logo has been around for a long time, so naturally is very difficult to CR7's brand to over take that.
I am with you. Never liked them, never bought them. But we are definitely in the minority on this.
 

chiz2kul

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Zero chance. The state of this place :lol:
 
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Brightonian

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Air Jordans invented this whole category of product marketing. It's like asking if the latest Samsung can be as iconic as the first iPhone.
 

Inigo Montoya

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He hasn’t done too badly out of it :lol:

Something tells me that he won’t go hungry