Gender Equality

Marketing Strategies

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Overall Observations:

In such a gender-oriented industry, like sporting goods sales, it would be impossible to create a marketing strategy without utilizing the stereotypes of the two genders to reach a specific audience for a product. Unfortunately, in our experience, we found that this is taken too far in many cases. We observed that sporting goods are directed at very specific and highly stereotypical audiences.

Marketing Men's Goods:

~The most obvious marketing strategy in sporting goods stores are the pictures on the wall of men and women participating in athletic activities. The pictures of males that we observed made them look rugged, strong and sweaty while doing activities such as lifting free weights or using weight machines.

~Areas of the stores that were stereotypically directed only as males such as golf and hunting were physically separated from the rest of the store. They are also given specific names such as "The Pro-Shop" and "The Lodge" which excluded them even more from the store as a whole, making them less welcoming to new customers, especially women.

~Most children's sporting equipment is marketed towards boys because there was an obvious amount of boxes with only boys' pictures on them. Even gender-neutral items like soccer goals featured a majority of male children playing in the picture on the front.

~Even websites can feature one gender more than another. Most sporting goods store websites that we visited concentrated much more on the needs of their male shoppers. The featured items were directed towards males, which we assume means that the store thinks it will benefit more from having marketed directly to men over women on the webpage.

~The packaging on larger, more physical items like exercise machines often feature images of men instead of women. This proves that manufacturers and marketers assume that mostly men will be buying and using these types of machines.

~Bicycles were split into categories to make it easier for customers to make an appropriate purchase. Unfortunately none of the options were specifically labeled "men's." There was a women's category along with mountain, comfort, BMX and youth.

Marketing Women's Goods:

~Pictures of women on the walls of sporting goods stores have more of a focus on overall physical fitness, such as running or other conditioning activities.

~There is a focus on breast cancer awareness so we found a large amount of pink items directed at women. Marketers know that women can be persuaded more easily when an item is connected with a good cause.

~Coated, colored free weights are marketed towards women as a softer, more feminine approach to fitness because the only other option is the rugged, uncoated metal weights.

~Certain stores label different sections as "men's" and "ladies." The word lady has a very different connotation than the word woman. Marketers are continually softening the image of women in sports, when sports should give women power and confidence to stand out.

~Packaging of smaller items like yoga mats and exercise balls feature pictures of women just because they stereotypically are used only by females.

~The window display at one store featured three mannequins, two of which were women golfers and only one was male. This is positive at first, but the male golfer was clearly placed much closer to the window and separated from the two females.