Behind the Shirt w/ Marc Wilson #4: Fashion or Face?

You will have to excuse me for the lack of submissions to my regular article, but I was a little tied up for a few weeks. More specifically last weekend when it was my wedding. So this is my first article as a married man. I promise I will be back on schedule now, aside from the week of my well needed honeymoon.

So, let me start off by saying that this will be the FIRST article you will read Post-UFC on FOX that is NOT someone’s (Educated or otherwise) opinion on the night. We get it, there was only one live fight but remember this… You didn’t pay for it, did you? Exactly! So don’t complain, and wait until an actual TV deal is in place where Zuffa isn’t paying for the spot. Hey, 5.7 million viewers is a good way to get negotiations started, don’t you think?

So here we go,

I wanted to get back on track with an article that will hopefully spark some conversations and debates. A debate that maybe I deal with more than the average fight fan does because I hear about brands and names being thrown around all the time to leverage business. Some times it works, other times it doesn’t.

So let the ultimate Fight Fashion debate begin: What is more important? Fashion or Face?

I will leave the big three brands out of this for the most part because they are the brands who can (and do) sponsor anyone available. It makes it tough to have them in this debate because they already have the means to succeed without major sponsorship deals (or they already have them). For conversation sake I will say the Big 3 are: TapouT, Affliction and a toss up between HeadRush and Dethrone. That’s not what we are debating here though, so let’s stay focused.

What would you do if your favorite fighter signed a deal with a company you didn’t like or have never heard of? Would you buy the walkout shirt if you didn’t like the shirt? Or what if you hated a fighter, but loved the design of a shirt and liked the brand? What influences the consumer more?

I would love to give you some statistical facts to back this up for you, but the truth of the matter is there doesn’t seem to be a science to it. Just when executives like myself or the brands that we talk to think they’ve found a pattern, it changes. So what variables do YOU think factor into it? I will give you some of my anticdotal insight on the subject and I want to know what you the readers think affects your decision on what you buy.

Fashion Factors:

QUALITY –

I, like many others am a fan of the more simple designs. That being said, when I approached FVSTR clothing to represent them prior to their release this past summer a select few knew who they were but for all intents and purposes were (and still are) a relative unknown. After some delays, sicknesses and identity crisis’ FVSTR seems to be back on track and ready to do what we always intended to do with the brand. However, before those delays we did have a few retailers pick up some of the summer tees and they have been selling out of designs that have never seen the light of a PPV or major event. The reason? When customers are in store they are sold on the QUALITY and FEEL of the shirts. So, obviously to a true consumer quality is a major factor, as aside from Brendan Schaub and some logo’s on shorts very few will have seen the shirts or even the new logo.

DESIGN –

Now that the Skulls and Dragons fad has passed, design creativity is coming to a point where brands are starting to make their own identity. I can say that there are more styles of designs than ever before in this industry and it is a refreshing to see. Design is a matter of opinion and is not up for discussion so this is a tough one. Not only that, it is never consistent. We see it all the time where someone says “I don’t like the fancy designs with all the foil and big prints… Blah, blah, blah” and that same person could pick the fanciest design as their favorite because it is the nature of good design and science of marketing rather than outside influence. I get this all the time with Lojak, they start with the “I don’t like this, that and the other thing…” and when the order comes in it is full of the fanciest designs. A good design should be something that someone likes without having the brand name as the deciding factor.

STYLE –

Not everyone wears the “vintage” style apparel, and not everyone wants the athletic fit. This is another tough one for brands, especially in a sport where fashion and form have to be taken into consideration. Afflictions cool designs and vintage tees look good, but would be terrible for training in. Tees that you would train in very rarely would make good walkouts. Some like thick material, some like thin. I hate thick collars, some like the AAA style shirt. Another 40% of the people, especially the fighters themselves “couldn’t care less”. Just like all the other fashion factors is really depends on what you are using it for. You also don’t always want to be the company that tries to change the views of the masses. Sometimes the effort involved in being different isn’t worth the time and money, right Mark Miller?

“Face” Factors:

WHO –

“Who” can make or break the sale of a product, that is why sponsorship is a major player in essentially every market. We’ve all seen random celebrity placement in cases where it makes you scratch your head… I swear, William Shatner promotes everything! Or what the hell is the point of cologne and perfume commercials? Anyways, the moral of the story is that a personal endorsement of a product can be important but is a MAJOR risk. In this specific industry the same fighters that are fan favorites are also hated to the same degree. Some people just like to be “different” for the sake of not being the same… MMA “Hipsters” I like to call them. “My favorite fighter is some obscure Norwegian named Olaf that fights in an undergroung fight league in Japan… Oh, you’ve never heard of him? Psssshhh”. Freakin’ Hipsters! So in the ultimate debate of this article, should the name on the shirt make a major difference in your decision? What if Olaf signed with TapouT and in true MMA Hipster form, the afformentioned moron hates TapouT? Would he buy Olaf’s walkout now?

NAME OR NOT? –

Another debate that I am also involved in a lot because I also do development and design work with brands, is whether or not the athletes name should/should not be on the product? I personally think that it limits your market, because I sure would not be caught dead wearing someone elses name on my shirt if I didn’t like the person. Then again, I might be convinced to wear something that I don’t necesarilly like the design if it was someone I liked. In my opinion, unless your name is going to sell thousands of shirts, don’t put it on there. Sometimes, even if it is going to sell thousands being descreet about branding is always more widely accepted. HeadRush can be very good at doing this, and I still think one of my favorite walkouts was my good friend, Mark Hominick’s walkout for his UFC 131 in my hometown of Toronto was a great marketing ploy and it continues to sell over a year later. I realize that “The Machine” now has his own branded walkout, but what other walkout could boast sales long after the fight?

TIMING –

Timing is everything with naming your products. One mistake brands make on walkouts is release time and also having products available in time for the fights. Not only that, but timing is huge when you spend thousands on sponsoring a fighter and they could lose, get injured and not fight, do something embarassing, etc. One brand that I have worked closely with has had such problems with their timing that retailers are just now getting the first and second versions of a popular fighters walkouts when he has had 4 fights since those releases. Timing can fail miserably. In my daily workings, I like how Punishment releases their walkouts and I have yet to have something backfire in the system. For example, I should be pre-selling Tito’s walkout for December starting today, and it will ship next week. Stores will have it in more than enough time to sell it before and after the fight, but also Tito is in a part of his training where he will have surpassed a point where he could get a major injury to back out of the fight.

So, those are 6 factors (I could keep going…) that would influence a decision to buy a product. Now, unlike other article where you read my opinions and walk away and forget about it, I would like to hear some opinions about the following:

What matters more? Fashion or Face?

What brands are successful at either one or the other?

What fighter would you buy products for, regardless of you opinion on the brands?

What brands could do no wrong in sponsorships to affect your purchases?

What would you do if you started your own brand and had “cart blanche” on who/how you sponsor?

Start the debate here at MMASucka.com, on Twitter @Derailed_Ind, on our Facebook Page: Derailed Apparel, my blog www.derailedindustries.blogspot.com/ or email us on the contact form on the website at www.derailedindustries.com and I will re-post the best responses. Please be professional about your opinions and keep it PG13 or at least R Rated.

Marc Wilson

Owner – Derailed Industries

www.derailedindustries.com