Li-Ning 'Wudao' at NYFW, market cap up HK$2.7B

On February 7, 2018, Li-Ning (李宁) appeared at the New York Fashion Week 2018 Fall/Winter runway under the 'Wudao' (悟道) theme, becoming the first Chinese sports brand to take the stage. On the runway were Chinese-character logos, founder's old-photo prints, a replica of the VICTOR001 Olympic award uniform, and traditional Suzhou embroidery (苏绣)—mixing 1990s retro, streetwear techwear, and futurism—and social media was flooded right after the show.

This show happened at the moment Li-Ning (李宁) most needed a turnaround: from 2012 to 2014, the company accumulated losses of over RMB 3.1 billion, many stores closed, and the brand looked both tacky and outdated to young consumers. That year, New York Fashion Week invited Chinese brand groups to appear under the name 'China Day' (中国日) for the first time, and Li-Ning (李宁) appeared together with Peacebird (太平鸟), Chen Peng (陈鹏), and CLOT, handing the runway styles to Tmall (天猫) for simultaneous sale in the official flagship store.

The effect was immediate: after the show, runway-style sales ranked among the top three in the sports category that day; more than 1,000 pairs of the same runway shoes and T-shirts sold out quickly; a RMB 699 sweatshirt was marked up to RMB 999; within one month, the share price rose from HK$6.04 to HK$7.29, and market cap increased by HK$2.725 billion. Founder Li Ning (李宁) wrote on Weibo (微博), 'China Li-Ning (中国李宁), please give us your guidance,' and the comments were flooded with purchase requests; guochao (国潮) thereafter became the engine of Li-Ning's (李宁) recovery.