If the shoe fits wear it

Article: Rapper’s sample athletes turf

By: Matt Sinnott

The industry

Basketball shoes are a big business that makes up a massive $16.4 million USD sneaker industry. Nike is the most dominant player in the industry, raking in around $12 billion last year.

Consider for a moment that people in Cleveland and Chicago were recently willing to camp out for up to four days just to get a $90 pair of limited edition LeBron James 'Chamber of Fear' sneakers

$55 billion footwear and sports apparel market.

And1 shoes doesn’t plan on endorsing an artist because they think that they sparked this movement.

Joining forces

Reebok's S.Carter Collection (by Jay-Z) became the company's fastest selling sneaker in company history

This industry grew 2.6% in 2003

Since 1993, hip-hop and rap has grown 13.8% of all music bought in the US.

A taste of the Market

Top selling shoes

Jordan's Air Force 1’s Shox Air Max Flights Uptempo Casual-adidas,

puma, pony, converse

The Jordan Era

The Jordan enterprise

Jordan is the longest running athletic shoe endorsement

Original deal was $2.5 million over 5 years in 1984

Most successful shoe line. Air Jordan's are now in their 20th

year

In fact Nike had to move back the launch date to Saturdays each year because too many kids were skipping school during the week to line-up for the latest Air Jordan launch

The Hip Hop Generation

“Rapper’s want to be ballers and ballers want to be rappers”-Jay-Z

Hip Hop Shoe Sector

Jay-Z-Reebok 50 Cent-Reebok Xzibit-Reebok Nelly-Nike Snoop Dogg-Pony Missy Elliott-Adidas Run DMC-Adidas Ludacris, Nelly, Usher

with Nike AF1 Baby aka: Birdman-Lugz

What is the craze all about

Hip hop artists shoe sales have outperformed athletes shoe sales. Is the craze due to the lifestyle these artists live? More and more artists are not only getting shoe deals, but more

endorsements as a whole. Casual shoe sales grew 24.5% in 2004 vs. a .3% increase for

basketball shoes Artists can get away with endorsing items despite there police records

and actions. Increasing exposure to the hip hop music industry Artists as businessmen/businesswomen Failures with big name athletes: Tim Duncan, Shaquille O’Neal, Kobe

Bryant A way to catch Nike because Nike isn’t joining the market

Issues in the Industry

Creative differences

Limits of the contracts

Troubled pasts of artists

Advertising

The next level

Magazines Commercials Music Videos Television-Bet, And1

Mixed Tape, MTV Private lines-Sean

John, Rocawear, Phat Farm

Product Placement Movies

Bibliography

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/2005-07-04-rap-endorsements_x.htm?csp=34 http://www.prohiphop.com/2005/07/rappers_replaci.html http://www.usatoday.com/sports/2005-07-04-madison-sidebar_x.htm www.usatoday.com/life/2003-06-25

www.findarticles.com/p/articles/ mi_m1571/is_n8_v13/ai_19199593

www.forbes.com/newswire/2003/06/15/rtr1000372.html

www.themightymjd.com/2005/ 07/athletic-endorsements-by-rappers.html

http://www.playingfieldpromotions.com/athlete-endorsements.asp

http://www.fradical.com/Rap_violence_costing_endorsements.htm

http://www.forbes.com/commerce/2004/02/19/cx_af_0219sneakerintro.html