Sporting Life Group has unveiled Team Town Sports, its third national banner that the company says will be an inclusive and elevated retail experience for team sports.
Added to a retail portfolio that also includes Sporting Life and Golf Town, Team Town Sports addresses what the company calls an “underserved” team sports arena within the consumer landscape.
“Our goal is to meet the needs of a diverse Canadian population with a model that feels welcoming and inclusive,” says Chad McKinnon, president of Sporting Life Group, who calls Team Town a reinvention of the sports retail experience.
Shoppers will find product assortment across all team sports for all genders and ages, including a dedicated section in each store catering to the youth sports segment. The company also says Team Town Sports will offer the “widest and most prominent product assortment for female athletes, a historically underserved customer base” in the Canadian sports retail market.
Frederick Lecoq, CMO of Sporting Life Group, tells strategy that Sporting Life and Team Town Sports offer a different product mix and focus for different customers.
“Sporting Life is the go-to destination for customers looking to find the intersection of sport and style, where Team Town Sports is dedicated to everything team sports, for all genders, ages and levels of sport,” Lecoq notes. Sporting Life’s assortment does feature some equipment, but it is mostly for individual sports, such as tennis, skiing, snowboarding, running and general fitness.
On the agency front, Team Town Sports will work with MSL Group for all PR efforts and DonerNorth for marketing initiatives.
Three initial locations are set to open in May – two in Calgary and one in Mississauga – with eventual plans for 25 locations across Canada that will employ upwards of 2,000 people. The store openings will be complemented with an ecommerce platform, and the stores themselves will feature the latest in simulation technology, deep service expertise and custom fitting for equipment, not unlike the experience currently provided at Golf Town.
“We’re very selective on the real estate side of things and are looking for standalone and big-box brick and mortar options,” Lecoq says. When planning out its first stores, there was the opportunity in Calgary and less in the GTA, he says. “Things are starting to change with the recent retail announcements, and our objective is to operate 25 stores across the country, so there will definitely be more to come in both the GTA as well as in Canada’s other provinces.”
