How the Wilson Sporting Goods Company was formed

Wilson, one of the most famous sporting goods manufacturers, was founded 110 years ago. And then nothing foretold that by-products of meat processing would become the main source of income for the company, and the Wilson brand itself would be associated not with a slaughterhouse, but with, perhaps, the most aristocratic sports – tennis and golf.

Branch of the meat processing plant

In 1913, the Sulzberger and Schwarzchild meatpacking company created a subsidiary called the Ashland Manufacturing Company. Its goal was to find all sorts of ways to use the by-products of meat processing – skins, sinew, etc. The company settled in Chicago, where its headquarters is still located.

As early as 1914, the Ashland Manufacturing Company’s products included strings for musical instruments, surgical sutures – and, more importantly in terms of the company’s subsequent history, strings for tennis rackets. Quite quickly, the company began to produce tennis rackets themselves, as well as sports shoes. And already in 1915, businessman Thomas Wilson became the head of the company, who a year later renamed it the Thomas E. Wilson Company. The current name – Wilson Sporting Goods Company – the company received in 1931.

Wilson himself was born in 1868 on a farm in the outskirts of London – however, Canadian London, located in the province of Ontario. His ancestors once came to Canada from Scotland, and Wilson himself moved to the United States quite early. By the time he joined his future company, Wilson had worked for another meatpacking company, Morris & Company, for more than 25 years, reaching the position of its president in 1913.

Upon joining the Ashland Manufacturing Company, Wilson almost immediately spun it off from Sulzberger and Schwarzchild and decided to concentrate on sporting goods. Wilson is best known as a manufacturer of rackets, balls and other tennis products. But from the very beginning, it produced sporting goods for a wide variety of sports – American football, volleyball, basketball, baseball, golf.

To expand production, Wilson almost immediately bought several other companies, including a manufacturer of golf bags and textiles for sportswear. And after the purchase of the Chicago Sporting Goods Company, the company became the supplier of uniforms and sports equipment for the Chicago baseball club Chicago Cubs. This strategy of regularly buying specialized companies and integrating them into its business, Wilson adhered to in the future.

Wilson grew very quickly: by 1918, its sales reached $ 1 million, which is a lot for a company that existed for only five years.

True, in the same year, Wilson himself left the company, whose activities he so successfully revived, in a more familiar meat processing business – he began to manage Sulzberger and Schwarzchild, renamed Wilson & Co. by that time. The Thomas E. Wilson Company maintained fairly close ties with this company for several decades.

Trendsetter

In the 1920s, Wilson was actively engaged not only in production, but also in improvements. It develops new standards for the American football ball and tennis ball tube.

During the same period, the company created an advisory group of athletes – and discussed their innovations directly with those who were to use them. It also became one of the features of Wilson. Throughout her history, she constantly consults with athletes, they helped her improve her equipment and at the same time advertised her well. One of those who actively collaborated with Wilson and helped her to improve products was the popular American football coach Knut Rockne in the 1920s.

These three ways – buying specialty companies, working closely with athletes, and striving to constantly innovate and improve sports equipment – were characteristic of Wilson in the future.

If the 1920s were for Wilson primarily the years of American football, then the 1930s were the time of golf. She regularly introduced new types of clubs and balls. In 1932, she introduced the sand wedge stick, which allowed the ball to be hit more efficiently from sandy obstacles. Now it is one of the popular types of clubs. In general, the 1930s, despite the Great Depression, were very successful for Wilson.

In 1941, the company became the official sponsor of the National Football League. And Wilson still makes balls for the NFL’s most important games. Later, the company will become the official supplier of balls for the National Basketball League and the most important tennis tournaments – the US Open and French Open.

During the Second World War, Wilson temporarily retrained in the production of military ammunition, and after 1945 returned to sporting goods. By the late 1940s, the company had 15 factories and over 30 sales offices and warehouses in the United States.

Golf and American football remained very important to Wilson, but it was then that the company became increasingly popular in tennis.

A significant role in this was played by cooperation with Jack Kramer, one of the most famous tennis players of his time. Over 30 years, more than 10 million rackets with his autograph have been sold.

The company continued to actively buy competitors. In 1955, Wilson bought Ohio-Kentucky Manufacturing, one of the most innovative American football ball manufacturers at the time. In 1963, Masters Golf Bag Company and tennis racquet maker Cortland Tennis Company. In 1964, a less obvious deal was made: Wilson bought the Wonder Products Company, a toy maker. The production lines of this company were quickly repurposed for football and baseball shin guards.

Desirable Purchase

After that, Wilson itself began to be regularly repurchased. In 1967, it was bought by the aerospace conglomerate Ling-Temco-Vought. And already in 1970, the company was acquired by PepsiCo. PepsiCo’s generous investment has allowed Wilson to begin expanding beyond the United States. Among other things, the US team at the Olympic Games performed in Wilson tracksuits. Also during this period, the company entered into agreements with many American retailers, so that its products appeared in Target, Sportmart, Kmart, Sears.

Wilson continued to actively collaborate with athletes: in the 1980s, basketball player Michael Jordan and baseball player Roger Clemens were among them. For more than a decade, the company has been selling 1 million balls a year signed by Michael Jordan.

In 1985 – a new deal. Wilson came under the control of investment fund Westray Capital Corporation. And then, with the help of the fund, the company became a subsidiary of the Finnish sports conglomerate Amer Sports. It is included in it even now, remaining perhaps the most famous (even better known than the parent company) of its brand. During these years, Amer Sports’ extensive marketing and distribution network throughout the world helped further spread Wilson’s products. By the early 1990s, Wilson accounted for 8.5% of the global sporting goods market.

Hollywood star

The Wilson brand with a characteristic W by this time had become recognizable around the world. And in 2000, the Wilson volleyball became one of the main characters in the movie Cast Away. “Wilson” becomes the only interlocutor of the protagonist, who ended up on a desert island.

In recent years, Wilson has remained a fairly stable company with fairly stable earnings, albeit without any incredible achievements. Moreover, the company continues to experiment. In 2021, with many stores moving online, Wilson, which previously sold its products through third-party retailers, opened its first physical store of its own. Since then, the network of such stores has continued to expand. Wilson positions them as a place not only to buy, but also to get acquainted with its products and company history, gain new experiences, etc.

In the same 2021, Wilson launched the first line not of sportswear in the strict sense of the word, but of casual wear, although, of course, in a sporty style. The company is still no stranger to innovation – for example, in March it introduced a 3D-printed basketball designed in such a way that it does not deflate and does not need to be specially inflated.

Yana Rozhdestvenskaya