FIRST DRAFT: S.W.O.T ANALYSIS

Strengths

Umbro’s strong points are definitely football apparel. Umbro are still kitting out many football teams every year; including England, Chelsea. The football boots which they manufacture are high quality and stick to the roots of the brand as they still make the original football boots which helped the brand excel. Although the different sections of Umbro apparel are not as clear and defined as they could be, they still sell a large variety of products. The price point is also another strength to the consumer, most products are largely discounted and the ones that are not, are still very reasonable. The more expensive products are the boots which is understandable as they are high quality. Collaborations with Missguided and Off White are intriguing and widen the target audience.

Weaknesses

Some negatives with Umbro’s brand position include the lack of advertisements on and offline. They need to promote their products otherwise it will result in the brand declining and audience consumption decreasing. The social media presence can be improved, on Twitter, they usually only use it to wish footballers happy birthday, never promoting new products. Their Instagram feed is also all over the place and do not get the audience engagement like competitor’s do.

Opportunity

Opportunities which Umbro could take on board might be opening their own stores with new and refreshed stock rather than relying on JD, Sports Direct and other third party brands to promote their products. It is clear to see that these stores are not promoting Umbro at all, so being your own promotor would be a great opportunity. By having an Umbro store they could have a collection which regularly changes, or ‘drops’ building audience anticipation and more engagement as it would make the audience want to travel to the store or click on the link to see these brand new products. This could create a cult following similar to Supreme and Palace increasing brand loyalty. Viral advertising campaigns to go alongside these drops would increase clicks and sales.

Threats

Other popular sports brands are the main threat to Umbro, they are succeeding with advertisements, collaborations and already having solid unique collections. For example; Adidas and Adidas Originals. Third party stores like JD and Sports Direct when advertising usually promote these more popular brands as they know that they will get the sales. Nike, Fila, Reebok for example, therefore they do not necessarily have the brands back. With the legal issues between Iconix Brand Group and Jay Z currently, this does not reflect well on the brand as Jay Z is a very popular influencer, he could take down Umbro easily. His voice would be heard by many people, possibly resulting in the brand continuing to decline.