Reeboks History in Short.

Reebok has always had a huge part in the sneaker industry and dates back to 1895. It was founded by Joseph William Foster (JWF) in Bolton, England and originally named the brand “J.W. Foster & Sons”.

It didn’t take long before JWF made the brand into a family business and brought his two sons in, thus changing the name to “J.W Foster and Sons”. The next stage for them was to open their factory called “Olympic Works”. They began to distribute sneakers across the country (UK) and quickly gained respect from all the runners with the continuous development of the running spikes that JWF originally made his name by, and making them pioneers in the industry and became even bigger during the 1924 summer Olympics.

1958 was when the brand became what we know it as today. Grandsons, Joe and Jeff Foster took their leave from the family business creating Mercury Sportwear. This was later renamed to “Reebok”, due to legal reasons. For those who didn’t know the name derives from the Afrikaans word “Rehbock”. The inspiration of the name came to them whilst looking through a South African dictionary. (The “Rehbock” is a species of antelope that roams the plains in African.)

The next chapter for them came at a trade show in 1979, Paul Fireman become the distributor in North America pricing the shoes at $60 which at the time made reebok the most expensive shoes on the running market. To help solidify their American dominance Joe Foster sold the US patent to Paul and another key investor to help speed up the process. This gave Joe the time to focus on the UK and Europe, whilst Paul was able to continue Reeboks forth coming success in North America without having to wait for feedback from the brands founder back in the UK.

What many don’t realise is that Reebok during the 80s and 90s dominated the industry with the release of “The Freestyle” in 1982. A women's sneaker made for the aerobic craze that took over, getting fitness pro Gin Miller to become the face of the campaign. Besides this they began to branch out into other sports and got other signings like Shaquille O’Neal (NBA), Peyton Manning (NFL), Venus Williams (Tennis) and Thierry Henry.

Reebok also made more history signing Jay-Z becoming their first non athletic signing and thus was born the shoe “Reebok S. Carter – Jay Z”.

The brand has since became a subsidiary of adidas in 2005. adidas later acquired all of Reeboks leftover share and the total ended up costing $3.8billion. Since then, adidas recently sold Reebok to the Authentic Brand Group (of which Shaquille O'Neill is a stakeholder) for $2.1bn.

Reebok still remains a powerhouse in the sporting industry although they likes of Nike and adidas have passed them now the Reebok brand name still has a huge presence within the industry.

Did You Know: JW Fosters & Sons created one of the first pair of running spikes, which is a necessity in any track and field event today.