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F: The tremendous growth of the sportswear industry had been one of the great success stories of recent years. Sportswear manufacturers have made a great deal of money. Here with me in the studio to talk about this is Brent Collins, of Super Fashion Limited, who in recent years has become one of the country’s leading manufacturers of sportswear.  Brent—I notice you aren’t wearing sports shoes or a tracksuit.
M: Not at the moment, Sandy, But I was earlier this morning.
F: Can we start off by looking at the finances of this great success stray? How much exactly is the sportswear industry worth?
M: At the moment I would say it’s worth something like ￡3,500 million a year.
F: To whom? Where are people going for their sportswear?
M: Well, traditionally, up to the end of the 8Os, shall we say, sportswear was produced almost exclusively by sportswear specialists and passed on to the department stores to be sold. In the last 10 years there’s been an interesting development of the mail-order business but most sportswear by far is still produced by sportswear companies like our own and then retailed through our own specialist outlets.
F: Approximately what proportion of expenditure on all clothing and footwear is spent on sportswear? Do you know?
M: I’m not absolutely sure of the very latest figures, but it’s something in the region of 9%. That includes expenditure on children’s sportswear. What I think is more interesting or surprising is that a recent survey showed that last year 41% of sportswear was purchased by adults, not for use as sports clothes, not, I mean, to play a sport, but just as casual wear for their entertainment activities.
F: You say adults. But my impression is that it is the young who buy this sort of clothing. I mean, my mother hasn’t bought any sports shoes yet and they’ve been in fashion for years. I’m not sure she ever will buy any now.
M: Of course it basically is a youth market. However, one surprising fact is that the 16-25 age-group is in fact getting smaller and will continue to do so for a few more years. The size of this group has fallen from 9.5 million in the mid 1980s to something like 7.5 million now. And yet the sportswear market has expanded considerably during the same period. It can’t be simply a youth market.
F: What do you see as the reason for the development in sportswear?
M: It’s hard, if not impossible, to give you any single reason. There are even plenty of reasons why it shouldn’t have happened, such as the rising costs of production and marketing, leading to much higher prices. What’s clear is that changing social conditions have greatly helped. The market couldn’t have grown to its present size without the relaxation in codes of dress that has taken place since the late 70s. We bare relaxed some of our rules. This has allowed sports participants to wear their tracksuits and sports shoes for many other activities they are not designed for. At a very practical level, clothing and footwear which are suitable for sports are so easily used for other non-sporting activities as well. For DIY, or gardening, or just playing with the children.
F: And how do you see the future for sportswear?
M: I expect increased competition between the manufacturers to produce more attractive and fashionable materials. I don’t expect this to affect the number of manufacturers active in the marketplace but it could well bring the prices down.
F: Will we be wearing the same sportswear products then? Five years from now.
M: Almost definitely. This is not just a passing fashion. It will last. People young and old are putting an ever-increasing emphasis on the importance of feeling, and looking, fit and healthy. Most experts believe that sportswear will actually increase its market share over the next few years. There are two main reasons for this. Firstly, despite the fall in the 16—25 age-group, the amount of time available for leisure...