In 2004, just days after Greece unexpectedly won the European Soccer Championship, Adidas delivered more than 145,000 Greece team jerseys across markets in Europe. Smart marketing, right? Without a doubt. But perhaps even more impressive were Adidas’s global procurement efforts: Thanks to a centralized supply chain coordinated with its country-based sales subsidiaries, the company created just-in-time product not only for the championship team but also for the other national teams as they advanced through the series. To round out the success, Adidas’s flexible supply chain strategy delivered these sales at very low risk, avoiding any significant investment in materials or finished product.
A version of this article appeared in the September 2006 issue of Harvard Business Review.
