AND1

For other uses, see And 1.
AND1
Industry Sporting goods, footwear
Founded 1993
Founder Jay Coen Gilbert, Seth Berger, and Tom Austin
Key people

Endorsees: Rafer "Skip to my Lou" Alston

Lance "Born Ready" Stephenson
Products Athletic shoes, clothing, sports equipment, accessories
Parent Sequential Brands Group
Website and1.com
A pair of AND1 basketball shoes.

AND1 is an American footwear and clothing company specializing in basketball shoes, clothing and sporting goods. AND1 was founded on August 13, 1993, on the grounds of "All ball, nothing more". AND1 focuses strictly on basketball with an aggressive, in-your-face attitude in the design of their products and marketing of the brand. It is currently a subsidiary of the Sequential Brands Group,[1] and is sold nationally and around the world by Sporting Goods retailers. AND1 continues to sponsor NBA athletes, as well as numerous High School and AAU teams in America.

Company history

In 1993, AND1 began as a graduate school project partnership of Jay Coen Gilbert, Seth Berger, and Tom Austin while they were graduate students at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School. The company name is derived from a phrase used by basketball broadcasters: when a player is fouled while shooting, makes the shot and makes the awarded foul shot as well, they score the points for the made basket "and 1" for the made free throw. The brand started by selling T-shirts out of the back of a car, but caught fire right away. Early advertising strategies, used to distinguish their products from others, included other basketball slogans and trash talk, such as "Pass. Save Yourself The Embarrassment".

In mid of 1996, NBA star Stephon Marbury became the first spokesman for AND1.

In late 1998, a videotape containing streetball stunts was delivered to AND1 by Marquise Kelly, coach of the Benjamin Cardozo High school team in Queens, New York. The tape contained low quality camera moves, poor resolution and nearly indecipherable audio featuring a streetballer by the name of Rafer Alston. At the time, Alston was a student at Fresno State who had entered the 1998 NBA Draft. The videotape would soon be known as the "Skip tape", referring to Alston's streetball nickname "Skip to my Lou". Alston later signed AND1's first endorsement deal.

In 1999 at Haverford College in Philadelphia, AND1 shot their first series of commercials and print ads incorporating NBA players Darrell Armstrong, Rex Chapman, Ab Osondu, Raef LaFrentz, Toby Bailey, and Miles Simon. When the traditional marketing campaign proved unsuccessful, a strategy was formed to use the "Skip tape". It was edited and reprinted into 50,000 copies and over the next eight weeks, distributed across basketball camps, clinics, record labels. The tape would become the first "Mix Tape", and quickly made Alston into a celebrity. When AND1 became a product partner with FootAction, this strategy evolved into a national program.

Beginning in the summer of 1999, a free AND1 Mix Tape was given with any purchase. Approximately 200,000 tapes were distributed in the span of 3 weeks, making this promotion one of the most successful in U.S. retail history. Filmmakers were then sent across the country to capture and find the next streetball legend.[2]

AND1 is famous for the shoe known as the Tai Chi, famously worn by Vince Carter during the 2000 Slam Dunk Contest, where he put on one of the greatest NBA Slam Dunk Contest showings of all time.

In November 2012, AND1 signed then-Pacer Lance Stephenson to an endorsement deal.[3] Lance, aka “Born Ready”, is well known for his antics during the 2014 Eastern Conference Finals against the Heat, trash talking and blowing in Lebron James' ear.[4]

In celebration of their 20-year anniversary, the brand hosted the AND1 Labor Day Summer Remix, a $100,000 winner-take-all basketball tournament in August 2013. The tournament took place in Temple University in Philadelphia, and also included a $10,000 dunk contest.[5]

Paying homage to Brooklyn Streetball culture, AND1 partnered with SLAM Magazine to host numerous events surrounding the 2015 NBA All Star Game (played in the Barclays Center in Downton Brooklyn). Various charity events with two of New York's greatest streetball legends Lance "Born Ready" Stephenson and Rafer "Skip to My Lou" Alston were followed by the launch of an exclusive pop-up retail lounge on Flatbush Avenue across from Barclays Center.[6]

There are currently over one hundred AND1 High School and AAU teams playing across America in various tournaments and leagues.

AND1 Mixtape Tour

The AND1 team

The AND1 Mixtape Tour has featured streetball players of fame, including Skip to My Lou, Main Event, The Professor, Hot Sauce, Spyda, 50, and AO. AND1 players have made annual tours around America to recruit the next streetball legend. This recruiting has since been edited for airing as Street Ball on ESPN and ESPN2. It is also parodied in the movie Like Mike 2: Streetball as "Game On".

Video games

EA Sports' NBA Street, published in 2001, featured dunks and passes in AND1 fashion, but was licensed from the NBA. In 2002, Activision announced the first AND1 video game called Street Hoops, featuring AND1 players. Gameloft has also released a mobile game based on the AND1 franchise.

Title Publisher Developer Platform Release Date
Street HoopsActivisionBlack Ops EntertainmentPlayStation 2, Xbox, Nintendo GameCubeNovember 28, 2002
AND 1 StreetballUbisoftBlack Ops EntertainmentPlayStation 2, XboxApril 10, 2006

References

  1. ↑ "Sequential Brands Group Signs Definitive Agreement to Acquire Galaxy Brand Holdings (NASDAQ:SQBG)". ir.sequentialbrandsgroup.com. Retrieved 2016-04-25.
  2. ↑ "Chicago Sports Review -RIP Flash 1975-2004-". Chicago Sports Review. Archived from the original on 2007-03-11. Retrieved 2006-12-06.
  3. ↑ "Lance Stephenson Signs Endorsement Deal With AND 1 | SLAMonline". SLAMonline. Retrieved 2016-04-25.
  4. ↑ "GIF: Lance Stephenson Got Weird With LeBron". The Huffington Post. 2014-05-29. Retrieved 2016-04-25.
  5. ↑ "AND1 Hosts $100,000 Basketball Tournament Labor Day Weekend". The Hoop Doctors. Retrieved 2016-04-25.
  6. ↑ "AND1(R) Teams Up With SLAM Magazine to Pay Tribute to Brooklyn Streetball and New York City Basketball Culture During NBA All-Star Weekend (NASDAQ:SQBG)". ir.sequentialbrandsgroup.com. Retrieved 2016-04-25.

External links

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