Amer Sports highlighted its Ball and Racquet Sports segment, which includes the Wilson and Louisville Slugger brands, among other team and individual sports brands.
“We are pleased that Ball & Racquet growth trends continued to improve in Q4, with growth accelerating to 22 percent driven by strong trends in racquet sports, and also lapping inventory clearance at the end of last year,” commented Amer Sports CEO James Zheng.
Revenue increased 22 percent to $296 million in the fourth quarter, reportedly driven by Racquet Sports and Softgoods, and cycling against a 3 percent year-over-year decline in the prior-year fourth quarter. The jump in revenue came as the business continued to build on a sequential improvement throughout 2024 after posting a 14 percent decline in the first quarter, a 1 percent gain in the second quarter, and an 11 percent increase in the third quarter.
“The strong growth was also helped by easier comparisons from last year when Wilson went through a heavier liquidations period to normalize inventory levels,” said company CFO Andrew Page on a conference call with analysts. “We are very pleased with the strong rebound, but would caution that 20+ percent is not a sustainable growth rate, and we continue to expect Ball & Racquet to grow low-to-mid single digits long term.”
By category, the strong double-digit growth was said to be led by Wilson’s marquee Racquet Sports franchise as well as a small but fast-growing Softgoods segment, which now represents 10 percent of Ball & Racquet sales.
Wilson Softgoods doubled its business in 2024. Apparel and footwear now represent 10 percent of Ball & Racquet segment sales.
“As I mentioned, we are seeing strong reception to our Wilson tennis apparel and footwear offering, especially in the U.S. and China,” added Zheng. “In Q4 we opened net six new Wilson brand shops in China, bringing the total owned and partner store count in the region to 43 [stores].”
In 2025, Wilson plans to open approximately 50 Tennis 360 shops in China, between owned and partner doors.
“We are seeing very strong momentum in Tennis 360, especially in North America, Greater China and APAC. We also saw strong growth in Evoshield Apparel, Padel and Pickleball. Inflatable balls and baseball also grew in the quarter, while golf declined slightly,” said Page. “Our Tennis 360 continues to resonate very strongly with consumers, from performance racquets to our apparel and footwear offering.”
In North America, we opened a Tennis 360 concept store in the Dallas North Park Mall in Q4, which has been performing very well,” Zheng shared. “And we also will begin testing Tennis apparel in approximately 50 Dick’s Sporting Goods locations this year, including a Tennis 360 shop-in-shop in Miami.”
The company said that Wilson returned to its former No. 1 U.S. market share position in Performance Racquets in 2024, led by the recent Blade and Roger Federer racquet launches. In January, Wilson launched the Clash V3, which is also reportedly off to a strong start.
Ball & Racquet (Wilson) segment Adjusted operating profit margin increased 660 basis points compared to the fourth quarter of 2023 to negative 3.7 percent, said to be primarily driven by higher full-price sales given the inventory clearance in the second half of last year, when the channel inventories were reportedly elevated. The company said SG&A leveraged thanks to tight cost control on higher revenue.
The company expects the Ball & Racquet Sports (Wilson) business to see low- to mid-single-digit growth for the full year 2025 ahead and an Adjusted operating margin of approximately 3 percent to 4 percent for the segment.
Images courtesy Wilson Sporting Goods/Amer Sports
