Chinese Sportswear Brand Anta Way Ahead on DTC Sales

While international sportswear giants such as Nike, Adidas and Puma are bitter rivals, they all have one thing in common: they’re trying to cut out the middleman. As part of this strategy, Adidas said it aimed for its direct-to-consumer business to account for half of its total sales by 2025, a target that it missed by 10 percentage points. With DTC sales accounting for 42 percent of total sales in its latest fiscal year, industry leader Nike is one step ahead in the transition to a DTC-first future, but saw a regression from 44 percent in 2023.

Chinese sporting goods giant Anta is creeping up on the competition and recently overtook Puma for revenue, becoming the third-biggest sportwear producer globally. According to its 2025 interim report, direct-to-consumer sales already stand at 92 percent for Anta after an aggressive campaign, also leveraging the flourishing Chinese online marketplace and social commerce landscape.

Six years ago, the share of DTC sales was significantly lower for sportswear producers, at 32 percent for Nike and 33 percent for Adidas. Puma is surprisingly far behind at 25 percent in 2019 and just 32 percent in 2025. Anta first reported direct-to-consumer sales for 2020, when they already stood at 42 percent.

While selling directly to consumers has the potential to drive top- and bottom-line growth, it also comes with a new set of challenges. Whether it’s shipping individual parcels to consumers instead of in bulk to wholesale partners, handling returns or taking full advantage of gained customer insights – running a DTC business efficiently at that scale requires significant investment in marketing and supply chain management.