Adidas has been "testing a store where shoppers can design a sweater, have a body scan to determine fit and get it knitted by a state-of-the-art machine within hours," as the German company looks at ways to "respond more quickly" to customer demands, according to Emma Thomasson of REUTERS. The sportswear group is "working on several initiatives to cut the time it takes to get new designs to stores" from the 12-18 months "now standard in the sneaker industry," including opening factories "mainly operated by robots" in Germany and the U.S. At a pop-up adidas store in a mall in Berlin, customers designed their own merino wool sweaters for €200 ($216) each and then had them "knitted in the store, finished by hand, washed and dried, all within four hours." Adidas wants 50% of its products to be made in a "faster time frame" by '20, double the rate in '16, which it "expects will increase the proportion of products sold at full price" to 70% from "less than half now." Global Brands Dir Eric Liedtke said, "If we can give the consumer what they want, where they want it, when they want it, we can decrease risk" (REUTERS, 3/20).
