Adolf "Adi" Dassler founded the German sportswear company Adidas in the 1920s. He began by making homemade slippers with his family in Germany. In the 1920s, he started a shoe company with his brother Rudolph. After a falling out with his brother in 1948, Adi took his nickname and last name initial to create the brand name "Adidas." Through innovative shoe designs and marketing to athletes, Adidas became hugely successful. Adi Dassler is credited with revolutionizing the sportswear industry.

1. ON GLOBAL BUSINESSMAN

2. INDEX Profile Background Achievements Qualities Techniques and Strategies

3. ADOLF DASSLER Adolf “Adi” Dassler ( November 3, 1900 in Herzogenaurach, Germany- September 6, 1978 in Herzogenaurach) mainly known as Adi Dassler , was the founder of the German sportswear company Adidas.

4. BACKGROUND Making his humble beginnings as a cobbler in Herzogenaurach, Germany, adidas founder Adolph Dassler built one of the world's most popular brands of sports shoes and apparel. Growing up in economically handicapped, post World War I Germany, Adolph, nicknamed Adi, joined his family in making and selling homemade house slippers to put food on the table. Adi's sister marked chalk patterns on leftover military bags, while Adi glued, sewed and nailed the shoes together. During these years, Adi Dassler received his first training in the craft of making shoes.

5. The Beginning ...... The company began in the early 1920’s as slipper makers Gebruder Dassler Schuhfabrik, in Herzogenaurach, Germany, near Nuremberg. It was a joint venture started by Adolf Dassler and his brother Rudolph Dassler. One day in 1925 Adolf (Adi) Dassler designed a pair of sports shoes; thereafter he began to study the science behind kinetics and footwear. His first shoe, made from the few materials available in the difficult post-war period, was produced from canvas. By 1931 he and his brother Rudolph were selling special shoes for tennis players, and they soon began to design specific shoes for the needs of specific sports. The brothers were also quick to realize that athletes themselves were the best advertisement for their shoes.

6. THE NAME GAME In 1948 the Dassler brothers had a falling-out and never spoke again. After the world war II, Adolf Dassler took his nickname, Adi, and combined it with the first syllable of his last name to get "Adidas," with the accent on the last syllable.

7. ACHIEVEMENTS His shoes were first worn in Olympic competition in 1928, and from then on he worked with everyone from Olympic athletes to national soccer teams. Hundreds of world records, Olympic medals, and World Cup victories stand as a testament to Adi Dassler's life work. As his experience grew, so did his reputation. Dassler became widely known as the "equipment manager of the world.“ Recognizing the genius of Dassler's work, the American Sporting Goods Industry Hall of Fame inducted Dassler in 1978 as its first non-American member. "Today the world refers to Dassler as the founder of the modern sporting goods industry."

8. QUALITIES Adolf Dassler was innovative. Adolf Dassler was a master of shoemaking technology. Adolf Dassler was an excellent visionary. Adolf Dassler had qualities of a good entrepreneur which helped him to create one of the most reputed brands of the sportswear industry. Adolf Dassler had goal clarity. Adolf Dassler was determined to achieve his goals.

9. TECHNIQUES AND STRATERGIES An avid soccer player, Dassler began producing training shoes in 1920 when he was only 20 years old. He later began to manufacture soccer, tennis and running shoes. To ensure that each shoe would be both safe and performance enhancing, Dassler used his own athletic experience and the input of doctors, trainers and coaches and other athletes to guide the design of his shoes. The meticulous attention was paid to athletes' evolving needs. Adidas kept abreast of sport technology, incorporated the most advanced materials and apparel of that time to ensure performance and safety into its shoes . The company's aggressive marketing strategy helped in communicating adidas quality to as large and athletic an audience as possible.

10. TECHNIQUES AND STRATERGIES He considered any material that might enhance the performance of his shoes. Dassler experimented with sharkskin as a sole material and kangaroo skin for the sides of his shoes. It was Adi's creativity and mastery of shoe technology alone that catapulted adidas to the top of the athletic shoe industry. Innovation was the key strategy of Adolf Dassler for capturing the sportswear industry. Adi Dassler was the first entrepreneur to use sports promotion in order to make the public aware of his innovations.

11. Impossible is just a word made by man…..

12. By : Vibhore Sharma Deepan Gujrati Sammridh Varma