How Tommy Hilfiger Put Its Own Spin on Fashion’s Sports Obsession

“I’ve always been inspired by sports,” Tommy Hilfiger told The Business of Fashion while discussing his brand’s new partnership with Liverpool FC. “From the very beginning.”

It’s true that the Hilfiger brand has had some sort of presence in sport almost from the start, going back to an early 1990s partnership with Formula One’s Team Lotus. But it’s only in the last year that sports have truly moved to the center of the brand’s strategy. It may even be the key to its future.

Earlier this month, Tommy Hilfiger announced it would dress Liverpool’s men’s and women’s teams off the pitch, its first football partnership since a one-off collaboration with Arsenal in 2005. In August, Hilfiger became the official fashion partner of the new Cadillac Formula One racing team, in a deal that will see the brand outfit the team on and off the track. That came on the heels of Hilfiger sponsoring the Brad Pitt-starring “F1” movie in June. Hilfiger has also worked with the US Sail GP team since 2024.

Dozens of fashion labels have struck deals with athletes, teams and leagues in recent years. But Tommy Hilfiger’s efforts go a few steps further than your typical collaborations. For example, the brand is both dressing Cadillac’s drivers and making the team’s merchandise. Most fashion brands choose one or the other.

The brand was due for one of its periodic reinventions, and the surging popularity of F1, a sport already associated with Hilfiger for decades, came at exactly the right time.

The brand has undergone multiple evolutions over the years, from the logo-heavy looks of the 1990s to the sleek celebrity collaborations of the 2010s. But sales were slow to recover from the pandemic; Tommy Hilfiger’s name and red-white-and-blue logo lacked a clear identity.

“I think that we went through a period where there was some soul-searching going on,” said Virginia Ritchie, Tommy Hilfiger’s chief marketing officer.

The business is growing again, with revenue increasing 3 percent in the nine months ending Nov. 2, to $3.4 billion over that stretch. But that performance pales in comparison to some of the brand’s biggest competitors in Americana: Ralph Lauren’s revenue jumped 17 percent in its most recent quarter, and a newly resurgent Gap’s comparable sales grew by 7 percent in the same period.

This is where what Hilfiger calls the brand’s “fashion-tainment” strategy comes into play. It’s the brand leveraging and creating moments within pop-culture and entertainment to sell consumers on its fashion. These days, sports sits at the center of that conversation.

Hilfiger, himself, believes that the all-encompassing way his brand is embracing sports can be a differentiator for it and separate the brand from its peers, both culturally and financially.

“We like to do what other people are not doing.” Hilfiger said. “Otherwise, we’re going to show up as being mediocre. And I don’t believe in mediocrity. I want to be special.”

Everywhere All at Once

One of the keys to the brand establishing its ubiquity is the new “always on” approach it’s adopting through its partnership with the Cadillac Formula One team. The partnership is a major cog in the brand’s overall sports strategy.

“That’s not a marketing model,” Ritchie said. “That’s a new business channel.”

Sports and fashion partnerships come in a few different forms. Sometimes, they’re one-off collaborations, like what Hilfiger did with Arsenal for the FA Cup in 2005. The new Hilfiger deal with Liverpool FC is a long-term partnership with the fashion brand serving as the football club’s official outfitter. A third approach, typically favoured by sportswear giants like Nike and Adidas, sees brands sponsoring different teams and leagues to create their apparel both on and off the field.

Hilfiger’s deal with Cadillac F1 arguably goes beyond even that last model. When Cadillac’s inaugural Formula One season begins in March, the brand will be everywhere.

Cadillac’s F1 drivers and team will be wearing Hilfiger both in the paddock and on the track. Hilfiger will also be designing the team’s fanwear, which will include everything from replica uniforms to more common items like tees, hoodies, hats and more. There will also be one-off capsules and collaborations with third parties included down the line, Ritchie said.

For some brands, such an ever-present strategy with constant production might lead to concerns about consumer fatigue. But Hilfiger doesn’t seem too concerned about that. Instead, his focus is on telling the right stories and growing the brand in a way that keeps it accessible to fans while maintaining its quality.

“We’re a premium brand,” he said. “We like to think that we’re accessible, affordable, and we are really showing up with the right capsules as well as the seasonal storytelling.”

Only time will tell how impactful the brand’s F1 strategy is as far as sales go. The season isn’t set to begin until March and its fanwear collection hasn’t launched yet. But there’s no question that it’s already generated buzz from a marketing standpoint.

The Hilfiger-Cadillac partnership announcement generated $978,000 in media impact value the week from June 3 to June 10, according to data from Launchmetrics. The impact of the Liverpool partnership was even greater, according to the data. Hilfiger generated $2.3 million in MIV from Jan. 7 to Jan. 14 following its announcement with the historic football club.

Ritchie said she wouldn’t necessarily call what the brand is doing a sports strategy. Instead, it’s one rooted in simply following trends to the right places. Sports just happened to be where things landed this time. And it seems to be the right spot.

“Tommy talks about being the brand rooted in pop culture all the time. Where is pop culture, the cultural conversation moving? What is entertaining? Where is style influence happening today?” said Ritchie. “The reality is that for all three of those, sport is a very good answer.”

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