FILE – Italy’s Jannik Sinner walks off courtroom after defeating Colombia’s Daniel Elahi Galan within the males’s singles match on day seven of the Wimbledon tennis championships in London, July 9, 2023. (AP Photograph/Alberto Pezzali, File)
NEW YORK — Earlier than New York Style Week kicks off in Manhattan, among the incoming manufacturers are making an early first cease elsewhere — out in Queens, on the blue laborious courts of the US Open, the place play continues by subsequent weekend.
Simply 4 days separate the 2 crosstown spectacles, that are starting to have extra in frequent than ever earlier than.
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In a sport the place manufacturers like Nike and Adidas have been as soon as the one gamers, the logos of Gucci and Miu Miu have began to weave their approach in. Tennis trend has been surging, and the luxurious trend business doesn’t need to really feel unnoticed.
Luxurious trend partnerships within the tennis world traditionally have been considerably sparse. They’ve been testing the waters lately, and these days, the offers have been flowing — Bottega Veneta with Lorenzo Musetti, Burberry with Jack Draper, Canali with Stefanos Tsitsipas and Dior with Zheng Qinwen have all come since January.
Coco Gauff wore tennis attire partially designed by Miu Miu for 3 tournaments this summer time — “Style helps deliver informal followers to the game,” she mentioned — and top-ranked Jannik Sinner typically has carried a Gucci tennis bag onto the courtroom since their partnership started in 2022.
The collaborations are multiplying. And so they’re inflicting a buzz.
When Musetti debuted as a Bottega Veneta ambassador, the model’s first athlete, by sporting their white jacket at Wimbledon this summer time, each the sports activities and trend worlds have been taken.
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“It was actually cool as a result of each journal, each trend journal was speaking about it,” Musetti mentioned with a smile a number of days earlier than he began play in New York. “I believe the tennis courts will also be a stage.”
Tennis’ growing cultural capital has made the game simply that — a stage — for gamers and followers alike. However luxurious trend manufacturers are flocking in for extra than simply its latest reputation.
“Tennis is a marketer’s dream, as a result of it crosses so many demographics and nonetheless has status,” mentioned Meeta Roy, an affiliate professor of trend enterprise on the Style Institute of Expertise in New York who beforehand labored within the luxurious trend business.
“That (is) the problem of the luxurious model enterprise mannequin because it exists at this time: How do you retain your core excessive web value people? But additionally, a lot of the income is pushed by these which might be thinking about accessible luxurious. Oftentimes, you have got a two-tiered advertising technique for the completely different teams. … However tennis is that this place the place it could actually all exist collectively,” she mentioned.
The game’s historic affiliation with the rich, coupled with its skyrocketing basic reputation, is making its courts the right advertising alternative for the luxurious area.
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It doesn’t damage that the professional tour runs by many main cities throughout the globe, and there’s additionally the straightforward truth of “numerous intercourse enchantment,” in line with Stuart Brumfitt, editor of tennis life-style journal Bagel and a former affiliate editor at British GQ.
“With this youthful period (of gamers), they’ve all bought large social media followings. … They’ve bought a whole lot of attain,” he mentioned. “As a result of it’s a person sport, they don’t get misplaced within the group. If (a model) backs that particular person, they get all of their viewers.”
It’s that numerous attain that makes the US Open rival the opposite huge present on the town — New York Style Week, which begins on Sept. 11 — from a advertising perspective.
“Anybody who’s taking a look at content material from a model’s runway exhibits, they’re already a fan of the model. However when Musetti is busting out the (Bottega Veneta jacket) for the world, that’s a very completely different viewers,” Roy mentioned. “It’s all about attracting the nontraditional trend buyer.”
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In her phrases: “Everybody loves a very good present.”
