• by Karl Greenberg , February 22, 2010

 

Adidas and the National Basketball Association are hitting the malls. Adidas, which is the league's official uniform provider, has inked a deal with the NBA and mall-based retailer Champs Sports for an "Official NBA Shop at Champs Sports." The NBA Shop will debut in 69 Champs Sports stores this month and will be in the remaining 486 Champs Sports stores nationwide by the start of the 2010-11 NBA season, per the companies.

The store will be a dedicated retail space with "adidas NBA" apparel, on-court products, fashion and co-branded accessories.

The retail space-within-a-space will look like a basketball court. The spaces will also have images of NBA players, and each shop will have a dedicated local-team area. The chain will have season NBA-themed fashion collections starting with Adidas' "White/White" collection starting this spring.

The companies say the program will roll out nationwide starting at Champs Sports stores in Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, Orlando, Portland, and San Antonio. Additional shops will open by May in NBA playoff markets. The chain, Adidas and NBA are joint promoting with player appearances, social-media, and promotions, including those that will be centered on the fashion collections.

This is the NBA's biggest retail program since the league's program last year with Sears Holding for Sears' Protégé basketball footwear brand. That program involved the NBA, WNBA and the NBA Development League and retail efforts at Kmart and Sears. The NBA also has a virtual store at www.store.nba.com, and three physical stores: one on New York's Fifth Avenue and two in Beijing.

The Adidas Group signed an 11-year deal to be official uniform and apparel provider for the NBA, WNBA and the NBA D-League in 2006 when Adidas Group acquired Reebok International Ltd., which had been the League's exclusive uniform and apparel provider for the previous five years.