"Running is not growing from the front, it is growing from the back, with the new people that have gradually taken it up and who do not run very often." This is according to former athlete, Andreu Ballbé, commenting on the growth seen in the sports sector in recent years. Ballbé, who competed in the Montreal Olympic Games in 1976, knows all about the passion for running firsthand, but also what it means for a business that is suddenly all the rage.
Apart from being an athlete, he is also the founder and general manager of ChampionChip, the company that introduced an accurate digital system into races to monitor the arrival of participants at the finish line.
The 1995 Barcelona Marathon was the first to use the timing technology. Today, it is an established element in races. It is a chip carried by the runners during the race that synchronises with devices spread along the route and registering who and when each person passes the different points of the race.
Ballbé: "Races that have nothing special about them will die"
In the event, Jornades de l'esport: el fenomen del running, organised by the Pompeu Fabra University, Ballbé says that despite the boom in the sector "the races that have nothing special about them will die." Therefore, they opted to develop the yellow chip, designed for popular races. It is an example of how the market is full of opportunities and that the only requirement is to come up with a product adapted to the novice runner who is now discovering the virtues of running.
Runnerbox, the experience of running
Jonathan Florido is a computer engineer turned businessman. For just over a year he has been the CEO of Runnerbox, the startup he set up when he decided to leave his stable job to devote his time to the world of sport. He had worked as a university researcher and had spent time in different large firms, including a spell with CA Technologies, in California.
He is an example of an entrepreneur who saw beforehand that the union of sport, wellness tourism and gifts provided a business niche. "I gave it all up and began alone in December 2015 with a naff website. I saw that there was business there, fended for myself and now I have a team of three people and different investors," says Florido.
As he earlier explained to VIA Empresa, his product is an experience box that offers an inscription to one of more than 3,500 different races. In its first month, the product managed to attract some 500 customers. The success was due, he thinks, to the fact of "understanding who the customers are and knowing the value of the box to the person buying it and the one consuming it."
With good results under its belt, the company’s aim now is to expand into other segments. Florido thinks that the sport segment is "antiquated" from a business point of view –"and much more than just running"- so that he wants to extend their innovation and turn Runnerbox into a sub-brand of a larger company: "We are opting to slice up the market and bring out packs for cycling, gyms and other areas."
Florido: "Being cheap means being less profitable, which means you have to be different"
However, before that they have a new launch. According to the CEO, it is about a concept that does not exist on the market, a box that also offers a trip of two or three days. "You pay a fixed price, you choose the race and we find you accommodation and everything you need," he says. It is a business model used by other brands, such as La vida es Bella or Wonderbox, but for sports lovers.
For him, the key to success is in being different. "These days you are either cheap or different. Being cheap means being less profitable, which means you have to be different," he argues.
Runister, making money through passion
Runister, which is based in Singapore, was thought up by Alba Vázquez, from Reus, and Slovakian, Matej Jahnátek. The app has only been available on iOS for five months, but in this time it has attracted more than 30,000 runners around the world.
Vázquez: "We have turned running into a business through technology"
The origin of the business is to be found in a typical phrase everyone says: "Running is cheap." "Yet the truth is that it isn’t," insists Vázquez, "you need compression socks, leggings, a t-shirt good for circulation, a smartwatch, a mobile with music to motivate you... Before, none of these things were necessary!" So why are they necessary now? "Because we have turned running into a business through technology," she answers. And this is how Runister was born, from the idea of helping to keep costs down by paying runners to do what they like doing.
This application takes the information ceded by users so that it can be used to make money. It works, she says, "as a bridge between runners and companies or organisations that want information." They get Big Data that is vital for improving their products and finding potential customers, while the clients give up their data in exchange for the motivation provided by paid activities and being part of a community of sports people who receive, among other things, lifestyle advice on the startup’s blog.
Runnister is based on the logic that the sports market has followed with the inclusion of technology. Vázquez points out that nowadays we do a lot of activities with our smartphones in-hand, which explains why there are more telephones than people in the world. "And of the 2.1 billion smartphones there are, some 420 million belong to runners," she says, which account for 20% of all mobiles.
It is therefore far from strange that between 2005 and 2009, many apps appeared encouraging sport. They are online platforms that between 2013 and 2016 have been acquired by large sports equipment brands for huge amounts. "They did this because they want to know about the people who use their products so as to sell more and improve in innovation," she says, and that is what they offer with Runister.