Aug. 12, 2022
Jordan Hamm | How Brooks Running Is Building Their Trail Running Team
Jordan Hamm is a Sports Marketing Specialist and serves as the Trail Athlete Manager at Brooks Running based in Seattle, WA. This is another episode in our mini-series providing insights to the athlete-sponsor relationship in trail running.
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- For Athletic Greens, go to athleticgreens.com/singletrack to get $20 off your monthly subscription + 5 free travel packs and Vitamin D for a year.
- Get coached by Trails and Tarmac
Links:
Timestamps:
- (4:36) - how Jordan got started at Brooks Running and became their Trail Athlete Manager
- (7:23) - market trends that have led Brooks to invest more in trail running in recent years
- (9:59) - what a typical day looks like as a Trail Athlete Manager
- (12:03) - how important athletes are in the marketing a shoe brand
- (16:53) - the process of scouting for and recruiting athletes to the Brooks team
- (21:55) - monitoring Strava segments to scout for and recruit runners
- (24:54) - how much emphasis Brooks places on athletic performance versus social media performance
- (29:15) - whether Jordan would recommend aspiring sponsored trail runners to focus more on athletic performance or personal brand building
- (30:52) - breakdown of full-time versus part-time athletes on the Brooks roster
- (36:35) - whether there's enough or some publicly available information for trail athletes to access and use as part of their negotiation with brands
- (43:41) - distinction between athletes as independent contractors and employees
- (46:56) - whether contract NDAs hurt or help athletes and the brands
- (48:48) - whether the presence of NDAs indicates that athletes are getting a bad deal
- (50:18) - whether Brooks will experiment with building a co-located trail running team in the future
- (55:45) - Brooks events and athletes to watch out for in 2022 and beyond
- (57:43) - Scott Jurek's current role at Brooks
Additional Episodes You May Enjoy:
- #106 - David Kilgore | How On Is Building Their Trail Running Team
- #99 - Robert Muecke | How Adidas Terrex Is Building Their Trail Running Team
- #98 - Steff Gardner | How Salomon Is Building Their North American Trail Running Team