Word: footwear
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...right in most cases to regulate how a worker looks," says attorney James McDonald, senior partner at employment law firm Fisher & Phillips. Clothes can also hamstring careers. Barbara Pachter, a top business-etiquette coach, boils it down to fit (avoid too-short skirts or too-tight anything), accessories (particularly footwear), color (when in doubt, go with darks) and style (when in doubt, dress like the boss). The No. 1 mistake: looking too sexy. "Cleavage," she says, "is not a corporate look." Neither are toes...
...million in sales over the past year, had been scoring on the stock market too, making Plank's shares worth some $1 billion at the peak. But as Plank prepares to move the Under Armour brand out of its comfort zone into the cutthroat, $18.3 billion athletic-footwear market, he is exposing Under Armour's house to a tornado...
...would Under Armour risk the punishment? The company's apparel business is solid--up 37% in 2007--so Under Armour certainly doesn't need to jump into a new category to grow. "Maybe I'm a little naive as we approach the footwear market," says Plank, a former University of Maryland football player who started the company in his grandmother's basement more than a decade ago. "Maybe we don't recognize the fact that we're walking on a tightrope on the 55th floor. But the fact of the matter is, it feels right. And that's what brands...
...strategist, though, Plank is more brains than brash. Many analysts admire his approach to expanding his brand. Under Armour could have jumped right into one of the two biggest sports-footwear categories--running and basketball--to try to steal share from Nike, Adidas and other Bigfeet. Instead, the company chose a more disciplined approach. Under Armour tested the footwear landscape about two years ago, when it started making American-football cleats. Selling soccer shoes against Adidas and Nike would have been suicidal. Football is a small, specialized market--about $250 million in the U.S. "Our No. 1 goal was authenticating...
...cheap Chinese-made products. But this era may be ending. Most economists are forecasting a significant slowdown in worldwide GDP growth in 2008. This slowdown, predicts Lehman Brothers economist Sun Ming-chun, will prove to be the "unmasking of [manufacturing] overcapacity in China." Says Li of the Asia Footwear Association: "The cake is only so big, and when you have too many people trying to eat it, you will definitely have some go hungry...