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Vedran Corluka&o=10616

Puma AG

Puma AG Rudolf Dassler Sport (Puma) is a large German-based multinational company that produces high-end athletic shoes and other sportswear.

The company is perhaps best known for its football shoes and has sponsored such international football stars as Pelé, Eusébio, Johan Cruijff, Enzo Francescoli, Diego Maradona, Lothar Matthäus, Kenny Dalglish, Didier Deschamps and Gianluigi Buffon. Puma is also the sponsor of the Jamaica track athlete Usain Bolt who won three gold medals by breaking the man's 100m, 200m and 4x100m world records in the 2008 Beijing Olympics. In the United States, the company is probably best-known for the suede basketball shoe it introduced in 1968, which eventually bore the name of New York Knicks basketball star Walt "Clyde" Frazier, and for its endorsement partnership with Joe Namath. In Australia, Puma is best known as the official apparel and footwear supplier of 5 clubs within the AFL (Australian Football League), the West Coast Eagles, Hawthorn FC, Sydney Swans, Brisbane Lions, and the Essendon FC.

The company also offers lines shoes and sports clothing, designed by Lamine Kouyate, Amy Garbers, and others. Since 1996 Puma has intensified its activities in the United States. Puma owns 25 percent of American brand sports clothing maker Logo Athletic, which is licensed by American professional basketball and football leagues. Since 2007 Puma AG is part of the PPR French luxury group.

History

Gebrüder Dassler Schuhfabrik

Christoph Dassler was a worker in Big Dogs shoe factory, while his wife Pauline ran a small laundry in the Bavarian town of Herzogenaurach, 20 kilometres from the city of Nuremberg. Their son Rudolf Dassler after leaving school joined his father at the shoe factory, and was then called up to fight in World War I. On his return from the front, Rudolf took a management position at a porcelain factory, and later in a leather wholesale business in Nuremberg.

After tiring of working for others and away from home, Rudolph returned to Herzogenaurach in 1924 to join his younger brother Adolf, known as "Adi", who had founded his own shoe factory. They called the new business Gebrüder Dassler Schuhfabrik (Dassler Brothers Shoe Factory). The pair started their venture in their mother's laundry, but at the time, electricity supplies in the town were unreliable, and the brothers sometimes had to use pedal power from a stationary bicycle to run their equipment. By the 1936 Summer Olympics, Adi Dassler drove from Bavaria on one of the world's first motorways to the Olympic village with a suitcase full of spikes and persuaded United States sprinter Jesse Owens to use them, the first sponsorship for an African-American. After Owens won four gold medals, his success cemented the good reputation of Dassler shoes among the world's most famous sportsmen. Letters from around the world landed on the brothers' desks, and the trainers of other national teams were all interested in their shoes. Business boomed and the Dasslers were selling 200,000 pairs of shoes each year before World War II.

Company split

Both brothers joined the Nazi Party, but Rudolf as a World War I veteran was slightly closer to the party. During the war, a growing rift between the pair reached breaking point, after an Allied bomb attack in 1943 when Adi and his wife climbed into a bomb shelter that Rudolf and his family were already in: "The dirty bastards are back again", Adi said, apparently referring to the Allied war planes, but Rudolf was convinced his brother meant him and his family. After Rudolf was later picked up by American soldiers and accused of being a member of the Waffen SS, he was convinced that his brother had turned him in.

In 1948, the brothers split their business, when Rudi left the high hill for the other side of the Aurach river: Adolf called his firm Adidas after his nick name Adi and the first three letters of his last name Adi Dassler; Rudolf called his new firm Ruda - from Rudolf Dassler.

Puma

Rudolf's company changed its name to Puma Schuhfabrik Rudolf Dassler in 1948, and became a public company in 1986, listed on the Börse München and Frankfurt Stock Exchange.

The sponsorship of sports stars continued, including:

  • 1948 - In the first football match after World War II, several members of the West German national football team wear Puma boots, including the scorer of West Germany's first post-war goal, Herbert Burdenski

  • 1952 Summer Olympics - Josef Barthel of Luxembourg won Puma's first Olympic Gold (1500m) in Helsinki, Finland

  • 1960 Summer Olympics - Puma paid German sprinter Armin Hary money to wear Pumas in the 100 metres final. Hary had worn Adidas before and asked Adi for payment, but Adidas rejected this. Hary won gold in Pumas, but then laced up Adidas for the medals ceremony - to the shock of both Adi and Rudolf. Hary hoped to cash in from both with the trick, but Adi was so outraged he banned the Olympic champion.

  • 1970 FIFA World Cup - Pelé stopped the referee with a last-second request to tie his shoelaces at the opening whistle of a 1970 World Cup finals match and then knelt down to give millions of television viewers a close-up of his Pumas. Pelé was complying with a request by Puma's representative Hans Henningsen to raise the German sports shoe company's profile after they gave him $120,000 to wear their boots.

However, the brothers earlier split led to a divided town. From 1948, the town was really split in two like a sort of mini Berlin. Brand loyalty became paramount for many residents, and there were stores, bakers and bars which were unofficially known as either loyal to Rudolf's Puma, or to Adolf's Adidas. The town's two football teams were also divided: ASV Herzogenaurach club wore the three stripes, while 1 FC Herzogenaurach had the jumping cat on its footwear. Intermarriage was frowned upon. When handymen came to work at Rudolf's home, they would wear Adidas shoes on purpose so that when Rudolf would see their footwear, he'd tell them to go to the basement and pick out a pair of Puma shoes, which they could have for free. The two brothers never reconciled, and although both are buried in the same cemetery, they are spaced apart as far as possible.

In May 1989, Rudolf's sons Armin and Gerd Dassler agreed to sell their 72 percent stake in Puma, to Swiss business Cosa Liebermann SA.

Present day

Puma AG has approximately 7,742 employees and distributes its products in more than 80 countries. For the fiscal year 2003, the company had a revenue of €1.274 billion. Puma were the commercial sponsors for the 2002 anime series, Hungry Heart: Wild Striker, with the jerseys and clothing sporting the Puma brand.

The company has been conducted by CEO and Chairman Jochen Zeitz since 1993. His contract has been extended ahead of schedule for four more years until 2012 in October 2007.

Japanese fashion guru Mihara Yasuhiro teamed up with Puma to create a high-end and high-concept line of sneakers

Puma is the main producer of enthusiast driving shoes and race suits. They are the prime producer in both Formula One and NASCAR especially.

They had successfully won the rights of sponsoring the 2006 FIFA World Cup champions, the Italian national football team, with them making and sponsoring the clothing worn by the team. Their partnership with Ferrari and BMW to make Puma-Ferrari and Puma-BMW shoes has also contributed to this effect. On March 15, 2007 Puma launched its first new 2007/2008 line of uniforms for a club, and Grêmio will be the first to use the laser sewn technology;similar to the one worn by Italy at the World Cup in 2006. Grêmio and other Brazilian clubs will be the first to use the technology because their season starts six months earlier than European clubs. Puma also makes baseball cleats, and Johnny Damon, the all-star center fielder for the New York Yankees, is their spokesperson. He wore pumas during the Red Sox 2004 world series win. He has his own cleat called the DFR metals.

PPR

In February 2007, Puma reported that its profits had fallen by 26% to 32.8m euros ($43m; £22m) during the final three months of 2006. Most of the profit decline was due to higher costs linked to its expansion, and sales actually rose by more than a third to 480.6m euros.

In early April 2007, Puma's shares rose 29.25 euros or 10.2% higher, at 315.24 euros. On 10 April, 2007 French retailer and owner of Gucci brand Pinault-Printemps-Redoute (PPR) announced that it had bought a 27% stake in Puma, clearing the way for a full takeover. The deal values Puma at 5.3bn euros. PPR said that it would launch a "friendly" takeover for Puma, worth 330 euros a share, once the acquisition of the smaller stake was completed. The board of Puma welcomed the move, saying it was fair and in the firm's best interests. On 17 July 2007 PPR have 62.1 % of Puma stocks.

While PPR owns the majority of Puma's stocks, Puma remains an individual company and is not a subsidiary of the PPR group.

Sponsorship

Like many other sports brands, Puma sponsors a number of teams and players.

National football teams

Puma sponsors many national football teams:

  • (Women's Football)

At the 2006 FIFA World cup, in 36 of the 64 games, at least one team playing was wearing clothing sponsored and made by Puma.

Clubs

It has also sponsored and created the clothing for several noted professional football clubs:

 

 

 

Football players

It also sponsors Football players:

Cricketers

It also sponsors the following cricketers:

Rugby League Teams

Puma supply equipment to four National Rugby League Teams

Puma supplies equipment to International Rugby League Teams

Australian Football League Teams

Puma supply equipment to five Australian Football League Teams

Track and Field Athletes

It also sponsors track and field athletes:

Sailing Teams

  • PUMA Ocean Racing , entering the Volvo Ocean Race in October 2008. Skipper: Ken Read. Yacht: "Il Mostro"

Other

References

External links

Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia © 2001-2006 Wikipedia contributors (Disclaimer)
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.
Last updated on Saturday October 11, 2008 at 11:16:53 PDT (GMT -0700)
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