New Balance’s sales increased 19% last year to $9.2 billion. This is as the legacy sneaker giant continues to outperform the global footwear market, taking share from struggling competitors such as: nike.
The 120-year-old privately held Boston-based shoe brand shared its 2025 results exclusively with CNBC. In addition to rapid growth in 2025, the company said it could reach its goal of $10 billion in annual sales by the end of the year.
“We’re competitive, there’s no question about that. But to get there and beyond, we want to make sure that the quality of our business is first and foremost,” CEO Joe Preston said in an interview with CNBC. “We don’t want empty calories here. We want to make sure we live up to our premise of being a premium brand. For the past five years, we’ve been doing exactly that around the world.”
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Since 2020, New Balance has seen a staggering 180% increase in sales, joining one of the few standout competitors to supersize its business while Nike has changed its business model and lost significant market share.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, Nike doubled down on its direct-to-consumer strategy of cutting off longtime wholesale suppliers to allow the sneaker giant to grow through its own website and stores. Although this strategy temporarily boosted sales and promised higher profit margins, New Balance, Brooks Running, On… deckers I filled it up quickly.
By focusing on building a direct-to-consumer model that can be more complex than distributing to wholesalers, Nike fell behind in innovation and lost its edge in the performance shoe market. This created more opportunities for competitors like New Balance.
While former Nike CEO John Donahoe previously blamed remote work during the pandemic for the retailer’s lack of innovation, Preston said the global crisis has created an opportunity for teams to come together like never before and execute new strategies.
“We met every Tuesday morning at 7:30 a.m. and we still do that every week. That’s what helped us navigate this global attack… We’ve come out of the pandemic stronger than any other company in our industry,” Preston said. “The market disruption that’s happening, the Nike example, certainly all of those things are real, but at the same time I don’t think that’s why we started to emerge.”
Preston said the company has differentiated itself from competitors and gained market share by “staying in front of the consumer” and focusing on when, where and how people want to shop.
The CEO said New Balance’s growth was across a variety of geographies and categories and was driven by an aggressive store opening plan with 80 new doors opening in 2025 alone.
Although store openings are an important revenue driver, opening stores is expensive and takes time for profits to appear. When asked, New Balance did not provide profitability details, so it’s unclear how much weight these investments have on earnings and whether the company will be able to maintain the high growth it has enjoyed.
To strengthen its business after more than 100 years in the market, New Balance took some cues from Nike’s strategy. The company said a key driver of growth was its ability to establish itself as a premium brand, which was critical to Nike’s ability to become a roughly $50 billion powerhouse.
This means New Balance is selective in both distribution and discounts. This move has helped the company increase average selling prices by about 30% over the past five years, at a time when many competitors have had to rely on promotions to boost sales.
The timing was also good. Coming out of the coronavirus pandemic, New Balance relied on its heritage as a “dad shoe” from the 1990s, when that style was hugely popular among young shoppers. This has allowed them to tap into a younger consumer base that didn’t grow up with shoes and shoppers choosing sneakers not just for sports or working out, but as a fashion statement.
At the same time, the company fostered growth in its performance footwear business by partnering with major athletes such as Los Angeles Dodgers two-way superstar Shohei Ohtani, tennis star Coco Gauff, and Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen.
New Balance said it plans to expand its existing product line, develop new products and focus more on performance sales over the next year.
The company also hopes to continue expanding its direct-to-consumer sales by opening stores in strategic regions. While the direct sales strategy hasn’t worked out well for Nike, Preston said he’s trying a different approach.
“One thing we haven’t done is [DTC] “Our goal is to perform at our best, and we want to make sure that it’s not about being the biggest part of the business,” Preston said. We don’t want to interfere with how consumers want to shop. We want consumers to be able to shop the way they want. We just want to look great. ”
