This week saw the grand opening of the Frasers Group’s new combined “next generation” flagship Frasers and Sports Direct store at the Meadowhall Shopping Centre in Sheffield, totalling 100,000 sq ft.
Of that space, Sports Direct has perhaps surprisingly been attributed with a majority 55,000 sq ft on level one of the shopping centre – a vast space that also takes in designated areas for Frasers Group’s other retail brands, Evans Cycles and GAME.
If anyone needed it reaffirming that Sports Direct’s grand transition from pile it high and sell it cheap sportswear to major player in quality sports performance apparel, footwear and accessories is complete, then they should check out this new store. It’s really quite something.
On a private store tour prior to its opening with Ger Wright, Managing Director of Sport at Frasers Group, TheIndustry.fashion got a real insight into the Sports Direct of 2024 and beyond.
Ger Wright
The new store sees Sports Direct relocate from its previous 35,000 sq ft space at the other end of Meadowhall – which only closed on Tuesday night – to the “elevated” new 55,000 space, complete with an additional 150 members of staff, which is now housing a wider selection of brands and “better products”.
Wright said: “We’re a sporting goods retailer and we lead through the lens of performance – with four large categories; Football, Running, Outdoor and Training. They are the categories that will come to life in our new space.”
Judging by the attention to detail for each of the designated areas for the main four categories (there’s also a Lifestyle area – with T-shirts, fleece, footwear and more), it’s fair to say they will indeed “come to life” – particularly when customers flood in tomorrow for the store’s first weekend of trading.
Sports Direct launched its first Outdoor concept in March 2024 at its new Cardiff store, but Wright calls the new Meadowhall space its “latest and greatest” Outdoor concept.
“We know outdoor is a very big category within the sports industry,” said Wright. “We developed the concept in partnership with our brands and we wanted to bring this exciting new category to life. We also know that hiking is a sport that the younger consumer really wants to get behind.”
Like Frasers, Sports Direct has brought a number of new third-party brands into the business to elevate its offer in recent times, including 11 new brands in the last year and a half.
“We’ve brought in new brands such as The North Face, Columbia, Salomon and Osprey, and we’ve also done a lot of work on Karrimor – which is one of our own brands,” said Wright.
“The equity Karrimor has is very strong and the product has gone from strength to strength. We’re also increasing our marketing for it, and we have the right influencers as well.
“In Outdoor, we lead with footwear covering hiking, trekking and seasonal, and then we go into apparel. We’ve created a lot of really nice experiences, so you can test out your walking on different surfaces. We’ve also got a try-on area, so if you’re trekking with a heavy bag you can make sure you’ve got the right footwear.
“Then we go into accessories, which is very important in the world of outdoor. There’s a great selection of backpacks across all the brands we carry. Then we’ve worked hand-in-hand with our brands, including Terrex by Adidas, to bring their concepts to life.”
Echoing the words of David Epstein, Managing Director of Premium and Luxury at Frasers Group when discussing the new Frasers store at Meadowhall, Wright also affirmed the “fewer, bigger, better” mentality behind Sports Direct.
Frasers has a “fewer, bigger, better”
The new Evans Cycles shop-in-shop offers a wide selection of bikes, parts, accessories and clothing, as well as a bike workshop – with a separate entrance so customers can easily bring their bikes in and out.
“We own Evans Cycles and you will see standalone doors for the brand coming into our bigger flagship stores.
“We’ve got great brands in there like Trek and Rapha – which is another new one to our brand portfolio.”
Football is Sports Direct’s largest category, which sells a lot more than replica team kits, and Wright says they have positioned GAME with Football in the store because of the obvious beneficial adjacency – especially with the in-store PlayStation PS5.
“We have a massive kids’ business, but the PS5 station is for the kids and the adults – depending on who gets bored on a Saturday when they’re in-store shopping for back to school shoes!”
There’s a football area in every Sports Direct store, but the new elevated stores like Meadowhall take it up a level with dedicated boot rooms complete with astroturf.
“As Football is our largest category, we get ‘category speciality access’ across the big brands, so we’ll have the top-end elite price points,” said Wright. “We help the brands launch new products, across Adidas and Nike specifically. And the storytelling within the Football space just looks really fresh.”
Where as other Sports Direct stores may have replica “stadium seats” for customers to sit and try on football boots, the Meadowhall store has “manager’s seats” which Wright describes as “the best of the best”.
Additionally, a Nike Football department features in-store, only the second time the concept has been included within Sports Direct following the initial launch at the London flagship.
Featured in the new Running concept area is a cutting-edge running gait analysis machine to help consumers find the right product for their running journey, along with running shoes for different levels; ‘Everyday Run’, Off-road Run’ and ‘Fast Run’ for those who take things a bit more seriously – featuring some of the most advanced running shoes on the market. Brands include Nike, Adidas, Under Armour, On Running and Saucony.
“Running is one of the concepts that we are very proud of”, said Wright. “We developed it and launched it a year and a half ago when we opened the Manchester flagship store. Now we have nearly 150 of these concepts across our estate. There aren’t many retailers who can scale as quickly as we do.
“The Running concept at Meadowhall is consumer-led and we’ve worked with our big running brand partners, like Nike, Adidas, New Balance and Asics. We really put the consumer at the centre with end-use in mind.
“Previously we would have merchandised by brand, now we merchandise by end-use, for instance ‘Off-road’ is geared towards trail running, ‘Everyday’ can be from your couch to 5K, and ‘Fast’ is more for that marathon runner.”
SD Meadowhall. Photo by Joas Souza
Wright says that Sports Direct’s brand portfolio for running has gone “from strength to strength” and traction on higher end and higher priced running shoes, particularly in the ‘Fast’ category, is seeing increased growth.
“The gait analysis machine is a great tool for us,” said Wright. “In our other flagships, on average it gets 350 visits a week – converting 20% into sales. The machine is very intuitive. Previously you may have been running on a treadmill in-store, but nobody really wants to do that anymore. Now you just put your information in and then you are in the system.
“That helps us personalise a customer’s journey going forward as well, complete with a shoe finder to fit a customer’s needs. It recommends specific shoes and, if they are not in stock here, then we can get them shipped to the store of the customer’s choice – or to their home. There’s lots of interactive digital elements throughout the whole store now.”
Wright says that footwear across all categories represents about 40% of Sports Direct’s business, so it’s clear why there is so much choice at varying price points.
Sports Direct also now has a big marketing campaign with boxer Anthony Joshua and Under Armour – including some exclusive products – which is flagged up in the new store.
Unfortunately, Joshua was defeated by a fifth-round knockout by Daniel Dubois in his IBF world heavyweight title fight at Wembley Stadium last Saturday (which the latest Sports Direct and Under Armour campaign was launched to coincide with).
Joshua has since stated his career is “far from over”, which may be music to Frasers Group’s ears.
“We really think about our marketing campaigns across the board – always through the lens of performance,” said Wright. “And we work with all the brands around those campaigns. We’ve just come off a very exciting ‘Summer of Sport’ and we did a lot with the brands.
“We also have an exclusive campaign coming up with British sprinter Dina Asher-Smith in a couple of months and we are currently planning our Christmas campaign, which is very big for us.”
Also looking ahead, Sports Direct will open another two big flagship stores in 2025, one in Liverpool and one in Dublin. Wright commented: “They will probably be the last big flagships across the UK and Ireland for Sports Direct.
“The Liverpool store will be in the old M&S building in the city centre, and the new Dublin store will be on Henry Street/Mary Street – the old Debenhams building that is next door to Zara. The Liverpool store will open in June/July 2025 and the Dublin store will open in September 2025.”
The new Meadowhall store also has a Zara in close proximity, and Wright added: “Zara is a great adjacency for us. We’ve seen that at the Metrocentre in Newcastle.” It seems Meadowhall is about to get a whole lot busier.
