The apparel and footwear industries combined accounted for more than 8% of global climate impacts.

By 2026, Decathlon has made major commitments to reduce its footprint and protect the environment by all means possible.

Decathlon saw the opportunity in that no sports retailer really cares about their damaged activewear, nor is it part of their communication.

This is one of the reasons why people are ashamed to wear their slightly damaged gear that could still be repaired.

In addition, the fast fashion attitude has become increasingly characteristic of this industry, too.

And that eventually leads to people overbuying.

The Blue Thread of Fate campaign has not only helped curb the unnecessary throwing away of activewear but has also turned it into a sustainable advertising space for the brand.

Torn clothes.

People are ashamed to wear them.

And they will buy a new one right away.

But Decathlon saw an opportunity and turned these holes into sustainable ad spaces.

The world's biggest sports retailer simply said to its customers:

‘Stop overshopping and start wearing your visibly repaired activewear with pride’.

With the help of influencers, we launched a campaign to encourage people to wear mended clothes with Decathlon-blue thread without any shame.

We made free branded repair kits available for our customers and organised workshops to teach them how to fix their damaged pieces.

A visibly repaired activewear is a statement that the wearer cares about the environment.

Soon enough: people wearing blue thread repaired activewear as a statement appeared everywhere.

and what a surprise, there were hardly any Decathlon brands in their shared content.

These outfits - mostly from other brands - became organic ads for Decathlon.

The PR strategy for the "Blue Thread of Fate" campaign focused on creating a buzz around Decathlon's commitment to sustainability. The strategy used a combination of media outreach, social media, events to reach a broader audience and create a lasting impact in promoting sustainable fashion.

The caipaign's target audience includes environmentally conscious consumers, fashion enthusiasts interested in sustainability and fashion.

To get the press interested, we didn't issue a traditional press release, but invited them to a workshop with sampling, where we also asked them to bring their own damaged sportswear so they could repair it themselves, which resulted in much more engaging articles.

The key to the campaign was that we had to make visible blue stitching cool, so that it would be as widespread as possible.

To do this, we launched a digital, social and outdoor campaign with the help of influencers.

They were carefully chosen to effectively appeal to all target groups.

Meanwhile, we also launched a PR campaign to communicate with the workshops.

We also involved them in workshops in Decathlon stores to teach people how to sew with the blue thread.

As a result, blue stitched clothes started to appear in more and more places, and people were proud to wear them and share them with the #blue thread fate.

At the end of the campaign, we re-shared user-generated content - where people had repaired other brands' products - to communicate that Decathlon products do not seem to need repairing.

Decathlon's sales did not increase as a result of the campaign - but that was in line with our goal.

The campaign website generated the highest reach in 2023.

And people got to like the brand more - Engagement rate +5,2% compared to same period last year.

+13% AS A PURPOSEFUL BRAND Source: BAV

Campaign exposure raised brand advocacy by +5%.

As a result, the idea grew to the point where we were invited to appear on several morning shows and radio show and articles appeared in the country's biggest newspapers.

The blue thread even appeared in a video clip.

Earned media for the campaign: € 110 000 Euro

The best of all, however, is that we managed to change people's buying attitudes and get them to look at used sportswear differently.