• by Aaron Baar , September 8, 2015

The relationship between athlete and equipment is a particularly fraught one. Athletes cherish their equipment when things are going well, and curse it, throw it and break it when things aren’t. 

In a new brand campaign launching this week, Wilson Sporting Goods Co. is celebrating the relationship all athletes — amateur and professional, — have with their equipment in both good and bad times.

“As we talked to athletes, one of the things we were able to go on was that through the ups and downs and highs and lows, the thing that stuck with you was your equipment,” Amy Weisenbach, Wilson’s vice president of marketing, tells Marketing Daily. “We’ve always known that insight, but we wanted to bring it front-and-center.”

The centerpiece of the effort (called “My Wilson”) is a minute-long video, which blends professional athletes like Serena Williams, Roger Federer, Dustin Pedroia, Kerri Walsh Jennings and Brendan Steel, with amateur youth athletes. The video shows successes athletes have on the field, as well as their trials. “We’ve stood on the mountaintop,” Pedroia says, while Williams concludes, “and been knocked down to Earth.” The video shows the athletes throwing their equipment in frustration, noting “We don’t always get along.” But, the athletes explain, they always get back up. “Together, we’ve gone farther than we ever could have gone alone,” says one of the athletes. “This is my edge. My shield. My life,” they conclude separately. “This is my equipment, I’m nothing without it. And it’s nothing without me.”

The company is showing amateur athletes along with its professional “Advisory Staff Members” to illustrate that all athletes have similar stories in common, Weisenbach says. “At the end of the day, the journey’s the same. You still face the same great days and bad days,” she says. “And Wilson is there throughout that journey.”

Meanwhile, amateur athletes from around the world are being encouraged to insert themselves into the campaign by sharing a video clip of themselves with their (Wilson-branded) equipment on social media channels using the hashtag #MyWilson. The company will review the content and insert snippets into the already-existing video, which will then be shared across the company’s social and digital channels. (The company will also donate $1 — up to a total of $250,000 — for every uploaded photo and video to organizations  that provide youth sports equipment and encourage sports participation.)

Though the campaign will largely be digital and social in nature, the company will be expanding elements to television and other media, particularly during times of heavy sporting events (such as the U.S. Open, beginning of the NFL season and continuing college football this week), Weisenbach says. 

“It’s a big time of year for us, so we will be taking advantage of those moments,” she says. “[But] at the end of the day, our target is a specialist athlete, and we wanted to get very targeted with digital and social to reach them.”

Los Angeles-based integrated marketing agency Phenomenon worked with Wilson on the campaign. The company is also working with Whistle Sports Network to develop exclusive content, in which 20 of its creators will share their personal versions of the video and challenge their following communities to participate.