Nick Willis and Mary Cain to run for Tracksmith

Maybe Nick and Mary can convince Tracksmith's VC sugar daddies to stop lowering quality while increasing price every year.

It was so nice, during Tracksmith's first couple years in business, to have a brand where you could pay a little more for real quality running clothing. These days, you pay a little more to look like a New England prep school kid for a month or two until your gear wears out.

NY Times Article

Cain will take on a role as community manager for Tracksmith in New York City, where she will be tasked with building the brand’s presence in a city chock-full of running clubs.

What does this mean?

She will have a day job in addition to running. It appears that she will be a brand ambassador/ tech rep and make the rounds of NYC clubs, running shops, events, etc. to promote the brand. A good deal for Tracksmith, IMHO. If she doesn't return to the national scene, they get their money's worth if she can create sales and marketing opportunities in the NYC market.

Somebody get Ben Barrows' opinion on this.

Lou Serafini's job, but for NYC instead of Boston.

Suggests Tracksmith is looking at retail in NYC, which their CEO alluded to in a Believe in the Run interview last month.

If you're familiar with the Tracksmith store (The Trackhouse) on Newbury Street in Boston, and the events they put on, then you'd probably be familiar with the guy Lou Serafini who leads most of them. He is the store's "Community Manager". He's in charge of setting up, organizing, and managing the events tailored to get people into the store (weekly club runs, workouts, long runs, marathon weekend related events in the store, watch parties for big races, etc.).

So it sounds like Mary is taking on the role of the NYC version of what Lou does.

Nick Willis is the "client liaison". No idea what that means, but it sounds like he's taking on a customer service type job

But Cain will be actually wearing Nike shoes, correct? Just like Oiselle athletes used to, when there were a few.

professional athletes wearing clothing espousing amateur haha. If this isn't the ultimate act of "selling out" for tracksmith. I'm very happy that tracksmith is sponsoring athletes considering they're doing so well. They make decent enough quality stuff, but not much better than lower priced gear.

Note that one of NYC's most competitive clubs, the Central Park Track Club, left New Balance for Tracksmith this year. First that, then this.

Tracksmith is really trying to make it in NYC.

Hey, if you can make it there...

I would have to partly disagree. You might indeed look like a NE Prep but the pants and tops I have from them are indestructible. 1-3 years old various items, thousands of miles in Massachusetts winters/summers . I am not a huge fan of the prep look so I keep it simple with the styles I select. My only complaint is I feel like I am wearing Abercrombie with the preppy little hare logo. When I can I pick out clothes that don’t have it. Also props to a brand that truly focuses on the SPORT of running. Pumped that Nick has joined that crew!

This is pretty incredible news and kudos to Tracksmith for doing this. Obviously they expect to realize market growth and impression becasue of this and I think they'll realize some incredible gains as a result of these hirings. Both will be excellent ambassadors for the brand.

Also, most importantly, Mary Cain and Nick Willis will be employees. Not independent contractors (like 99.9% of professional runners), but salaried employees with wages and benefits. They don't need to worry about reduction clauses and presumably random termination. For Nick, this will lead to a great opportunity after 2021 as his career comes to a close and for Mary, this gives her a low stress opportunity to train, improve, and perhaps return to the international scene if that's what her goal is, without fear of losing her job if she gets injured or has a bad season.

Glad your experience has been different than mine. I live in MA as well. The Tracksmith clothes I bought in 2015-16 - various shorts, tights, and shirts - were great and some of them are still going strong. The stuff I've bought more recently (shorts and tights) fell apart after very little time, despite costing more now. Short liners and waistbands in particular are getting really stretched out very quickly.

Did Mary Cain ever graduate college?

Another overpriced retailer than will soon join J Crew in bankruptcy.

CGeorgeRun wrote:

This is pretty incredible news and kudos to Tracksmith for doing this. Obviously they expect to realize market growth and impression becasue of this and I think they'll realize some incredible gains as a result of these hirings. Both will be excellent ambassadors for the brand.

Also, most importantly, Mary Cain and Nick Willis will be employees. Not independent contractors (like 99.9% of professional runners), but salaried employees with wages and benefits. They don't need to worry about reduction clauses and presumably random termination. For Nick, this will lead to a great opportunity after 2021 as his career comes to a close and for Mary, this gives her a low stress opportunity to train, improve, and perhaps return to the international scene if that's what her goal is, without fear of losing her job if she gets injured or has a bad season.

From a short term PR perspective -- good because it gets a mention in the New York Times.

From a running perspective -- Mary is irrelevant and it seems strange to mention her "build up to Tokyo 2021.

From an HR/Risk Management perspective, I can't think of a worse hire -- it generally does not make sense to hire a sh*t stirrer.

Also, employees can be terminated at will (unless they have a contract for a certain term -- which is rare).

So basically they had to get real jobs- good luck! now they will find out the ugly truth of how hard it is to make a living. Wow. I hope Nick saved some cash this looks like a real pain in the ass.

First and only time I hear a bad word about the brand and it’s from the peanut gallery on Letsrun; shocking.

orange 4evah wrote:

Note that one of NYC's most competitive clubs, the Central Park Track Club, left New Balance for Tracksmith this year. First that, then this.

Tracksmith is really trying to make it in NYC.

Hey, if you can make it there...

Funny you say that, because I heard it was due to the fact that many of the Central Park TC athlete's wore the free VaporFlys at the trials instead of their New Balance sponsor... And that they are only getting a discount from Tracksmith, not a full sponsorship for the team.

Their treatment of their athletes sounds great, but man, their clothes are ugly. Prep school crossed with the 80’s leftovers in the high school XC closet.