Adidas may replace Reebok jersey branding

In the world of hockey jerseys, the word Reebok has become synonymous with repulsive to many. But that's not why parent company Adidas may soon swap out the name seen on the back of every NHL sweater.

CBC's Elliotte Friedman included an interesting tidbit in his 30 Thoughts article posted Monday. Specifically, he wrote:

Small business item: Reebok has the rights to make NHL jerseys. Its parent company, Adidas, apparently is considering putting its own name there instead of Reebok. As part of that, we may see an extension of the current contract, which runs through 2016-17.

This isn't totally unexpected. Adidas has been trying to reposition the Reebok brand back to its focus on runners — like it has been historically. From their mission statement:

At Reebok, our innovation focus is on fitness and training, where the priority is creating products that provide a material benefit to the consumer's fitness activities (e.g. flexibility or lightweight).

Hat tip to Matt Johnson for the link.

That said, I would've expected to see Adidas reposition CCM as the big name in hockey — as it has been historically. Plus, this is a brand that still has a very good reputation among folks who appreciate (and buy) hockey jerseys.

Then again, Adidas is a bigger name with better brand recognition — even if people like me associate them solely with soccer. Regardless of any branding changes, I would not expect the Edge uniform system to be replaced anytime soon.

Reebok's Ongoing Brand Transition

Reebok's branding transition continuesReebok, the manufacturer and designer of the often-criticized Edge jerseys, quietly began a branding transition back in 2008. Three years later, it's still ongoing and a recent change has spawned an abundance of emails and tweets from Icethetics readers.

In 2007 when the Edge jerseys were launched, the stylized "r" logo appeared on the back of every sweater just below the collar. It was also used on all the tags as well. That was the case until the following year when Reebok began implementing the new wordmark.

In 2008, the new logo began appearing on the tags of all the new jerseys — specifically the 18 third jerseys which were launched that year. I don't know whether the 2007 jerseys manufactured after 2008 started getting tagged with the new mark.

Now in 2011, the wordmark is transitioning to the back of the jerseys, unsurprisingly. The new NHL uniforms being launched this year all feature it. Though whether it will appear on jerseys produced prior to 2011, I can't say. For now, I'm basing this information on images in the NHL's online store.

Comparing the Reebok logo on NHL jerseys / NHL.com

Many of the emailers and tweeters who've asked about this are quick to point out screenshots from EA Sports' NHL 12 video game. I go through this every year with many of you, but it seems I always have to say this: For as much as EA supposedly takes care to be accurate with uniform details, these early game images are, at best, inconsistent. So let's not pretend they're gospel. We'll know for sure soon enough. The hockey season's not that far off.

I tweeted yesterday that I had something annoying to blog about regarding Reebok. This was it. Honestly, the reason I haven't written a post about this until now is that I didn't find it interesting or newsworthy. Icethetics is about team branding. I don't usually write about the corporate stuff. But enough of you brought it up to warrant a blog post. If you have any other questions, I'll do my best to answer them in the comments.