In uncharacteristic fashion, ASICS America Corp. last week reported that sales for the first half of 2004 increased 9.5% to $111.1 million versus the first half of 2003. Footwear sales outpaced total sales, increasing 11.2% for H1.

Jim Hoff, AAC’s VP of Sales, said that total incoming footwear orders were up more than 36% at the end of the first half. The company highlighted the GT-2090 running shoe, which had a 50%+ increase in sales for the period, becoming the top selling shoe in the company’s history in the second quarter.

ASICS also reported that recent data from SportScanINFO showed the ASICS brand capturing the #3 spot in running footwear market share with 11.3% of sales for the period reported on July 11, 2004.

In other ASICS news, the company reported that the recent Sports Marketing Surveys USA survey of running specialty shops found the ASICS brand voted “Number One Overall” by retailers.